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RED  TERROR  AND  GREEN 


RED  TERROR  AND 
GREEN 

The  Sinn  Fein-Bolshevist  Movement 
BY  RICHARD  DAWSON 


BOSTON    COM  FRF    ,,r,n 

NEW  YORK 
E.  P.  DUTTON  &  COMPANY 

681  FIFTH  AVENUE 


Copyright,  1920, 

By  E.  P.  Dutton  &  Company 


All  Rights  Reserved 


.3\  3 


7UUOO 


Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.    Ireland  Changes  her  Mind 1 

II.    Idealism  Awakes 11 

jamill.    Sinn  Fein .     ...     .  27 

IV    Enter  James  Connolly 43 

V.    Labour  and  the  Union 56 

■"*»VL    The  Revolutionary  Movement 69 

VII.    The  Nineteenth  Century 84 

VIII.    Stormy  Petrels .     .     .  102 

— *-IX.    Undercurrents 118 

X.    Arms  and  the  Man 141 

XI.    Privy  Conspiracy  and  Rebellion    ....  164 

XII.    Makers  op  Mischief 187 

XIII.  The  Bolshevik  Alliance .  208 

XIV.  A  State  op  War 229 

XV.    Conclusion 253 

Index 267 


RED  TERROR  AND  GREEN 


RED  TERROR  AND 

GREEN 

CHAPTEE  I 

IRELAND   CHANGES   HER   MIND 

War  found  Nationalist  Ireland,  after  a  century 
of  wandering  in  the  political  wilderness,  within 
sight  of  her  goal.  It  did  more;  it  unclasped 
the  deadlock  which  the  Palace  Conference  had 
failed  to  solve,  and  which  threatened  to  produce 
one  of  two  unfortunate  alternatives,  either  such 
a  recasting  of  the  Home  Kule  Bill  as  would  have 
embittered  the  relations  between  the  component 
parts  of  the  United  Kingdom,  or  such  an  en- 
forcement of  the  measure  as  would  have  caused 
permanent  embitterment  in  Ireland  itself.  The 
relief  of  the  minority  at  being  rescued  from  the 
dire  extremity  of  resistance  was  probably  not 
greater  than  that  of  the  reflecting  section  of  the 
majority  who  realised  that  to  set  forth  on  self- 
government  amidst  storms  of  hatred  would  be 


2       IEELAND  CHANGES  HEE  MIND 

but  a  poor  augury  of  a  successful  voyage.  But 
the  War  did  even  more  than  that.  It  provided 
Nationalist  Ireland  with  an  opportunity  such  as 
Fate  seldom  vouchsafes,  the  chance  of  once  and 
for  all  silencing  the  voice  of  her  detractors  and 
winning  the  respect  and  confidence  of  her  foes. 
And  then,  deaf  to  the  wise  counsels  of  her  lead- 
er, blind  to  the  glowing  example  of  tens  of  thou- 
sands of  her  valiant  sons,  she  deliberately  threw 
the  chance  away.  Like  another  Penelope,  she 
unravelled  in  a  night  the  fabric  she  had  been 
weaving  for  a  hundred  years. 

In  the  face  of  a  decision  so  surprising  and 
momentous  it  is  not  a  little  curious  that  a  con- 
siderable number  of  men  still  talk  and  write  and 
think  in  terms  of  the  Home  Eule  controversy  of 
five  years  ago.  The  columns  of  the  Press  teem 
with  correspondence,  arguing  for  and  against 
partition,  setting  forth  the  respective  merits  of 
different  forms  of  Dominion  self-government, 
and  comparing  them  with  the  American  State 
system.  Even  the  Government  convened  a  Con- 
ference among  the  ruins  of  Dublin  to  devise  a 
scheme  that  should  reconcile  conflicting  inter- 
ests in  an  agreed  measure  of  Home  Eule.  Such 
well-meant  activities  are  based  on  the  theory — 
and  must  be  abortive  if  the  theory  be  incorrect 
— that  Ireland's  attitude  during  the  last  four 


THE  NEW  MOVEMENT  3 

years  is  the  outcome  of  discontent  with  the  de- 
tails of  the  Home  Rule  Act,  at  worst  manifesting 
itself  in  one  of  those  sporadic  and  short-lived 
outbreaks  of  the  insurrectionary  movement 
which  is  endemic  in  Irish  politics.  According 
to  this  view  Sinn  Fein  is  merely  the  reincar- 
nation, under  another  name,  of  the  movement 
which  called  itself  Young  Ireland  in  1848  and 
Fenianism  in  1867. 

Certain  affinities  of  course  all  revolutionary 
parties  must  needs  have  in  common:  " There 
is  a  river  in  Macedon  and  a  river  at  Monmouth 
and  there  is  salmons  in  both."  But,  as  it  is 
the  purpose  of  this  book  to  show,  the  affinities 
of  Sinn  Fein  with  the  revolutionaries  of  the 
last  century  are  entirely  superficial.  The  re- 
semblance indeed  is  hardly  skin  deep.  It  is 
important  to  note  the  relations  between  the 
revolutionary  and  constitutional  agitations  in 
Ireland  since  the  Union.  The  two  movements 
ran  parallel.  The  extremists  were  no  doubt 
ready  to  push  their  line  beyond  the  limits  set 
for  themselves  by  the  moderate  wing  of  the 
Nationalist  Party;  they  were  anxious  to  move 
faster;  possibly  they  chafed  at  and  despised 
the  caution  and  half  heartedness  of  the  mod- 
erates, but  they  never  tried  to  thwart  or  trip 
them  up.  The  revolutionary  vein  which  lay  be- 
neath the  surface  only  out-cropped  during  the 


4       IRELAND  CHANGES  HER  MIND 

periods  when  the  constitutional  movement 
was  utterly  stagnant.  The  Young  Irelanders 
only  made  their  effort  at  times  when  the  Repeal 
agitation — which  they  supported — had  burned 
itself  out.  The  rebellion  of  1848  came  when 
0  'Connell's  agitation  had  died  away.  The  Fen- 
ian Rising  came  half-way  between  the  Tenant 
Right  and  the  Land  League  movements,  when 
the  demand  for  self-government  had  sunk  to  an 
almost  inaudible  whisper.  The  fact  that,  despite 
the  existence  of  the  Clan-na-Gael,  Ireland  had 
not,  until  Easter  Week,  had  an  armed  rising  for 
fifty  years  may  be  attributed  to  the  vigour  and 
constancy  with  which  the  constitutional  section 
were  pressing  their  claims. 

It  is  even  more  important  to  note  the  alacrity 
with  which  the  champions  of  independence  and 
physical  force  lent  their  aid  to  the  advocates 
of  limited  self-government  and  parliamentary 
methods  when  their  own  methods  had  failed. 
The  man  who  had  been  "out"  in  '48  and  '67 
was  the  peaceful  voter  of  1880,  giving  loyal  sup- 
port, even  in  the  Palace  of  Westminster  itself, 
to  men  whom  he  knew  were  out  of  sympathy 
with  his  extreme  views.  Even  the  Clan-na- 
Gael  did  not  disdain  to  provide  the  sinews  of 
war  for  a  policy  which  fell  far  short  of  its  ambi- 
tions.    The  extremists  acted  on  the  principle 


SINN  FEIN  STANDS  ALOOF  5 

that  half  a  loaf  is  better  than  no  bread.  Some, 
no  doubt,  reflected  that  if  they  could  not  jump 
the  stream  they  might  cross  it  by  stepping 
stones,  but,  whatever  their  motives  may  have 
been,  the  significant  fact  remains  that  the  revo- 
lutionary movement  of  the  last  century  never 
showed  any  jealousy  of  the  constitutional  party. 
Contrast  such  a  policy  with  that  of  Sinn 
Fein  and  mark  how  sharp  is  the  differentiation. 
So  far  from  showing  any  sympathy,  even  tacit, 
with  the  United  Irish  League,  when  it  has  not 
held  sternly  aloof,  it  has  been  actively  hostile. 
It  fought  its  only  parliamentary  election  prior 
to  the  Dublin  rebellion  against  Mr.  Eedmond's 
official  nominee  in  1907.  Even  when  the  Home 
Eule  Bill  was  marching  triumphantly  through 
Parliament  its  journals  were  snapping  and 
snarling  at  the  heels  of  the  Parliamentary 
Party.  And  then,  when  the  Parliamentarians 
had  triumphed,  when  the  Home  Eule  Act  stood 
on  the  Statute  Book,  and  when  it  only  needed 
a  few  months  of  sacrifice,  not  uncongenial  to  an 
ardent  and  pugnacious  race,  to  procure  the  con- 
summation of  Ireland's  dreams,  this  body, 
hitherto  insignificant,  whose  snarlings  the 
Nationalists  had  treated  as  they  might  the  pet- 
tish snapping  of  a  pom-pom,  brought  their  ef- 
forts tumbling  to  the  ground  as  a  mischievous 


6      IEELAND  CHANGES  HEE  MIND 

child  overturns  a  house  of  cards,  the  pride  of 
its  patient  builder. 

The  suddenness  and  apparent  wantonness  of 
the  catastrophe,  which  wrecked  not  only  the  Act 
for  the  Better  Government  of  Ireland,  but  what 
was  even  more  important,  the  visions  of  a  new 
era  of  closer  comradeship  between  the  warring 
elements  of  the  country  which  Mr.  Kedmond's 
appeal  had  evoked,  has  generated  the  theory 
that  it  came  through  some  gadfly  madness  seiz- 
ing upon  a  people  wearied  with  a  long  struggle 
for  liberty,  sickened  by  hopes  deferred,  and 
turning  against  leaders  of  whom  they  were 
tired,  as  the  children  of  Israel  turned  against 
Moses  besides  the  waters  of  Marah. 

If  this  be  the  explanation,  then  the  task  of 
settling  the  Irish  question  is  comparatively  easy, 
no  more  difficult  than  fishing  up  a  broken  sub- 
marine cable,  splicing  the  fracture  and  setting 
the  electric  current  running  through  the  wires 
again.  The  question  arises  whether  this  is  the 
real  explanation.  It  might  account  for  the 
refusal  to  enlist,  and  the  overthrow  of  the 
Nationalist  Party  at  the  polls — though  the 
pertinacity  and  magnitude  of  the  opposition 
hardly  coincide  with  the  theory  of  the  movement 
being  only  a  sudden  and  passing  whim.  But  it 
does  not  square  with  the  main  facts.    It  does  not 


A  FAULTY  THEORY  7 

account  for  the  astonishing  rise  of  Sinn  Fein  in 
the  course  of  a  few  weeks  from  a  poverty- 
stricken  body,  with  only  one  branch  outside 
Dublin,  without  any  commanding  or  notorious 
figures  among  its  leaders,  without  a  Press,  to 
an  organisation  which  sweeps  the  constituencies, 
establishes  its  own  Parliament,  controls  the  lo- 
cal authorities,  and  holds  three-quarters  of  the 
country  in  thrall.  Above  all,  it  does  not  account 
for  the  Dublin  rebellion  and  the  German  alli- 
ance. Rational  beings  do  not  take  such  meas- 
ures because  an  Act  of  Parliament  falls  short 
of  their  desires.  ' '  No  man, ' '  said  John  Mitchell 
from  the  dock,  "  proudly  mounts  the  scaffold 
or  coolly  faces  a  felon 's  death  .  .  .  for  nothing. 
No  man,  be  he  as  young  or  vain  as  you  will, 
does  this  in  the  insolence  of  youth  or  the  in- 
toxication of  vanity. " 

Had  these  events  been  emanations  from  Sinn 
Fein  alone,  the  theory  that  they  represented  but 
a  passing  phase  would  be  infinitely  more  credi- 
ble than  it  is.  Great  political  movements,  still 
less  revolutions,  are  not  begotten  by  highbrows : 
they  are  the  products  of  flesh  and  blood.  The 
antiquarian  enthusiasm  of  Dr.  Douglas  Hyde 
might  create  a  new  Nationalism  inspired  with 
scholarly  ideals ;  the  intellectualism  of  Mr.  Ar- 
thur Griffith  could  give  it  practical  direction; 


8      IRELAND  CHANGES  HER  MIND 

the  Abbey  Theatre  could  invest  it  with  a  gener- 
ous warmth  and  colour.  Men  reared  in  such  an 
atmosphere  might  overthrow  Home  Rule,  not  as 
wanton  children  poking  at  a  house  of  cards,  but 
with  the  deliberate  belief  that  it  was  a  flimsy 
temple  housing  false  gods,  but  they  would  have 
lacked  the  driving  force  that  alone  can  generate 
revolutions  and  give  persistence  to  great  politi- 
cal movements. 

The  idea  may  come  from  above,  the  driving 
force  always  comes  from  below.  It  is  born  not 
of  the  brain,  but  of  bodies  festering  in  the  un- 
speakable pollution  of  Dublin  slums,  and  of 
blood  boiling  under  the  oratory  of  men  like 
James  Larkin,  coarse  and  vulgar  if  you  will, 
but  all  the  more  inflammatory  for  that.  The 
force  gets  solidity  and  permanence  when,  behind 
the  wrong  and  the  demagogue,  stands  a  direct- 
ing mind,  such  as  James  Connolly's,  fired  with 
indignation  and  sympathy  and  stored  with 
knowledge.  And  when  from  those  stores  of 
knowledge  he  constructs  a  creed  in  which  ma- 
terial reform  blends  with  the  revival  of  ancient 
national  ideals  and  traditions  and  with  political 
emancipation,  then  indeed  we  can  feel  that  we 
are  in  face  of  an  abiding  force. 

The  actual  situation,  then,  is  not  just  a  simple 
clash  between  rival  Nationalists,  but  one  very 
grave  and  complex.  To  hope  to  solve  the  Irish 


SEEKING  INSPIEATION  9 

question  by  paper  constitutions,  constructed 
without  examination  of  all  its  factors,  is  to  try- 
to  draw  the  subject  of  a  jig-saw  puzzle  after  put- 
ting half  a  dozen  pieces  into  place.  Such  an  at- 
tempt must  at  best  be  futile,  at  worst  it  may  be 
fatal. 

It  is  the  aim  of  the  writer  to  describe  the  new 
Nationalism,  not  as  it  appears  to  him,  but  as  it 
is  conceived  by  its  authors  and  made  manifest 
by  events.  The  new  Nationalism  is  still  in 
process  of  evolution,  and  of  evolution  so  swift 
that  before  these  words  see  the  light  it  may  have 
taken  on  new  accretions.  Even  so  far  as  it  has 
gone  it  has  radically  altered  the  orientation  of 
the  Irish  problem,  and  therefore  calls  for  con- 
sideration by  all  who  hope  to  solve  it. 

To  achieve  the  task  we  must  follow  the  course 
of  two  streams  of  thought,  starting  from  a 
common  source,  diverging  for  a  time  into  paral- 
lel channels,  and  then  again  uniting  to  form  the 
Irish  movement  of  to-day.  On  the  one  side  we 
shall  find  ancient  Irish  culture  invoked  to  create 
an  artistic  and  intellectual  revival :  on  the  other 
we  shall  find  the  ancient  Irish  politico-economic 
organisation  being  invoked  as  the  inspiration 
of  industrial  liberty.  We  shall  see  how  Gaelic 
decadence  is  ascribed  to  the  loss  of  the  old  tra- 
ditions, and  how  the  guilt  is  fastened  not  only 


10     IRELAND  CHANGES  HER  MIND 

on  English  Machiavellianism,  but  on  Irishmen, 
posing  as  patriots,  but  unconsciously  betraying 
their  country  by  setting  forth  their  aspirations 
and  demands  in  terms  of  Anglicised  politics. 
We  shall  see  the  old  idols  of  the  market-place 
and  platform  overthrown,  and  unknown  figures 
installed  on  the  empty  pedestal,  great  names 
besmirched  and  ridiculed,  and  names  long  for- 
gotten blazoned  in  their  place.  Irish  history 
will  be  presented  in  new  perspective,  in  which 
the  battle  of  the  Boyne  becomes  smaller  than  the 
battle  of  Kinsale,  in  which  Sarsfield  has  less 
significance  than  Lalor,  and  Thompson  displaces 
Grattan  as  the  moulder  of  Ireland's  future.  And 
finally  we  shall  see  how  the  new  Nationalism, 
starting  with  lofty  ideals  of  national  regenera- 
tion on  the  old  lines  of  the  ancient  culture,  be- 
gins to  seek  its  inspirations  from  modern 
sources  of  unspeakable  corruption. 


CHAPTER  n 

IDEALISM  AWAKES 

In  the  summer  of  1893  Irish  Nationalism  had 
fallen  upon  evil  days.  The  tide  which  during 
thirteen  years  had  floated  it  so  high  had  spent 
itself  and  was  on  the  ebb.  Mr.  Gladstone  was 
about  to  retire,  weary  and  disappointed,  leaving 
behind  him  none  who  could  bend  his  bow;  Mr. 
Parnell  had  fallen,  leaving  behind  him  a  riven 
party,  distracted  by  jealousies  and  dissensions. 
Yet  this  year,  which  seemed  to  be  a  gravestone 
in  the  cemetery  of  Ireland's  hopes,  has  come  to 
be  described  as  a  landmark  in  her  progress.  And 
all  because  half  a  dozen  men  met  in  Dublin  in 
July  and  founded  a  society  to  promote  the  study 
of  the  Irish  language. 

The  formation  of  the  Gaelic  League  was  not 
on  the  face  of  it  a  world-shaking  event.  Except 
for  Dr.  Douglas  Hyde,  its  founders  were  un- 
distinguished men,  unknown  outside  their  own 
narrow  circles.  Its  object,  though  respectable 
and  interesting,  did  not  promise  to  stir  Ireland 

11 


12  IDEALISM  AWAKES 

to  its  depths.  Although,  throughout  the  nine- 
teenth century  archaeologists  and  scholars  had 
studied  the  Gaelic,  and  although  there  was  in 
existence  in  1893  a  Society  for  the  Preservation 
of  the  Irish  Language,  the  youth  of  Ireland  did 
not  kindle.  O'Connell,  the  great  National 
Leader,  was  a  native  speaker  of  Irish,  but  he 
refused  to  speak  anything  but  English,  and  en- 
couraged his  countrymen  to  follow  his  example. 
Common  sense  seemed  to  coincide  with  his 
counsel.  What  a  waste  of  time  did  it  appear  to 
spend  time  in  mastering  a  dialect  confined  to  a 
handful  of  people,  mainly  peasants,  which  might 
be  used  to  unlock  the  doors  leading  to  the  learn- 
ing of  Europe.  Goethe,  Schiller,  Dante,  Cer- 
vantes, Eacine  and  Moliere,  Victor  Hugo  and 
Dumas — who  would  give  up  the  chance  of  read- 
ing their  works  in  order  to  study  the  Annals  of 
the  Four  Masters  or  the  Books  of  Ballymote  and 
Lecain  in  the  original?  Interesting,  no  doubt, 
they  were,  but  if  Ireland  were  to  keep  abreast  of 
the  times,  her  people  had  to  study  languages 
that  were  living,  not  dead.  Every  argument 
that  is  used  against  Greek  to-day  could  be  used 
with  tenfold  force  against  the  study  of  Irish. 
The  Gaelic  League  set  itself  to  combat  that 
view,  and  found  its  weapon  not  in  philosophy, 
but  in  Nationalism.    In  the  disuse  of  the  Irish 


A  NATION'S  SOUL  13 

language  it  saw  not  the  loss  of  a  dialect,  but  the 
loss  of  a  nation's  soul.  Though  literary  in  its 
outward  manifestation  and  strictly  non-political 
in  its  constitution,  it  was  a  system  of  political 
philosophy  operating  through  a  literary  me- 
dium. Its  purpose  was  to  keep  alive  the  Irish 
tongue  in  order  that  the  soul  of  Ireland  might 
not  die.  To  that  it  postponed  all  other  consider- 
ations. To  the  Gaelic  League,  as  to  other  Irish 
parties,  England  was  the  enemy,  but  less  per- 
haps because  of  the  loss  of  an  Irish  Parliament 
than  because  of  the  loss  of  the  spirit  of  Irish  na- 
tionality. That  Irish  representatives  should  sit 
at  Westminster  was  regrettable,  but  less  because 
it  bespoke  the  political  subjection  of  the  Irish 
people  than  because  it  promoted  their  Anglici- 
sation.  This  doctrine,  if  not  directly  opposed  to, 
cut  clean  across  the  theory,  certainly  held  by 
O'Connell  and  in  greater  or  less  degree  by  lat- 
ter-day Nationalists,  that  Ireland's  short  cut  to 
self-government  lay  through  assimilation  with 
British  aims  and  ideals.  To  the  Gaelic  League 
such  teaching  was  anathema.  Under  Home  Rule, 
so  gained,  whatever  it  might  bring  of  gratified 
pride  or  material  advantage  wouldbe  outweighed 
by  the  loss  of  conscious  nationhood.  Even  were 
the  last  link  broken,  Ireland,  unless  she  were  an 
Irish  Ireland,  would  be  decadent  though  free. 


14  IDEALISM  AWAKES 

It  need  not  be  thought  that  the  founders  of 
the  Gaelic  League  had  in  1893  envisaged  the 
implications  of  their  creed  quite  so  definitely 
as  this,  still  less  that  they  proclaimed  them  quite 
so  frankly  to  their  disciples.  Otherwise  they 
would  not  have  found  recruits  where  they  did, 
even  among  Unionists.  The  non-political  char- 
acter of  the  society  was  always  kept  in  the  fore- 
ground. Even  in  1914  Dr.  Douglas  Hyde,  an- 
swering complaints  "from  many  parts  of 
Ireland  that  the  Gaelic  League  was  rapidly  be- 
coming a  political  body,"  entered  a  very  elo- 
quent and  impassioned  defence,  quoting  words 
he  had  used  the  year  before. 

"Suppose — which  God  forbid — that  any  one 
political  party  did  succeed  in  getting  hold  of  the 
machinery  or  the  name  of  the  Gaelic  League  and 
succeeded  in  running  the  League  on  party  lines, 
I  tell  you  that  on  that  very  day  the  transcendent 
significance  of  the  language  movement  would 
fail.  The  entire  structure  .  .  .  would  fall  to 
pieces.  The  language,  which  would  then  be 
looked  upon  as  the  appanage  of  a  single  political 
sect,  and  not  the  inheritance  of  a  nation,  would 
go  down  in  contumely  and  dishonour." 

And  then  he  continued : 

"The  cause  of  Irish  nationality  was  too  holy, 
too  sacred  a  thing  to  be  stained  by  the  dust  of 


THE  CLOVEN  HOOF  15 

warring  factions  or  disturbed  by  the  wranglings 
of  ephemeral  party  politics.  The  Gaelic  League 
was  the  one  spot  in  Ireland  where  a  truce  of  God 
prevailed,  and  every  Irishman,  no  matter  what 
colour  his  coat,  no  matter  what  his  creed,  or 
class,  or  politics,  was  free  to  enter  in  and  enjoy 
the  fragrance  and  the  perfume  and  the  flowers, 
and  the  soothing  breezes  which  blew  like  balm 
through  the  enchanted  gardens  of  Holy  Ire- 
land."* 

In  this  purple  passage  Dr.  Hyde  no  doubt 
enunciated  the  principles  which  mainly  animat- 
ed him  and  his  fellow  founders  of  the  League  in 
1893,  and  which  were  then  convincing  to  persons 
of  politics  most  dissimilar.  But  his  words  were 
less  convincing  at  the  time  he  spoke  them  and, 
despite  his  assurance,  large  numbers  of  mem- 
bers left  the  League  for  the  very  reason  against 
which  he  protested.  That  he  was  able  to  utter 
them  at  all  is  either  a  singular  instance  of  self- 
delusion  or  an  equally  singular  example  of  self- 
detachment  from  contemporary  events.  Eight 
years  before,  Mr.  John  Sweetman,  a  leading 
Gaelic  Leaguer,  had  said: 

"Out  of  the  Gaelic  League  have  already 
grown  a  series  of  movements  not  only  strongly 
political,  but  each  and  all  making  for  a  separate 

*  Irish  News,  October  15th,  1914, 


16  IDEALISM  AWAKES 

Irish  nation,  freed  from  every  link  of  the  Brit- 
ish connection. ' '  * 

In  a  printed  circular  of  March  4th,  1906,  the 
Clan-na-Gael,  which  has  always  kept  alive  the 
fire  of  Irish  Eevolution,  thus  handsomely  testi- 
fied to  the  work  of  the  Gaelic  League : 

"The  work  of  the  Gaelic  League  is  in  line 
with  the  object  of  the  Clan-na-Gael.  It  is  pre- 
paring the  mind  of  the  country  for  that  su- 
preme effort  which  will  lead  to  the  final  triumph 
of  the  Gael.  Although  a  non-political  organisa- 
tion, and  acting  openly  within  the  existing  law, 
it  is  steadily  creating  the  conditions  which  will 
make  a  free  Ireland  possible." 

Dr.  Hyde  was  at  that  time  in  America.  He 
spoke  at  San  Francisco,  and  said  no  word  to 
repudiate  the  doctrine  of  Mr.  Sweetman  or  the 
Clan-na-Gael.  On  the  contrary,  what  he  said 
was  this : 

"We  aim  high,  for  we  aim  at  nothing  else 
than  establishing  a  new  nation  on  the  map  of 
Europe. ' '  f 

There  was  no  differentiation  between  a  spirit 
of  nationality  and  political  nationhood,  and  Dr. 
Hyde  himself  seized  the  occasion  of  a  public 
dinner,  following  the  National  Teachers'  Con- 
gress at  Sligo,  to  mark  the  kind  of  nationhood 

*  Freeman's  Journal,  January  31st,  1906. 
f  Gaelic  American,  March  31st,  1906. 


POLITICAL  ATHLETES  17 

he  wanted  by  ostentatiously  walking  out  of  the 
room  when  the  King's  health  was  proposed. 

Exactly  how  far  the  Gaelic  League  has  de- 
parted from  its  self-imposed  political  neutrality 
it  needs  not  further  to  inquire.  It  is  as  the 
originating,  if  not  the  immediate  cause  of  the 
New  Nationalism,  that  its  foundation  is  justly 
held  to  mark  an  era  in  the  history  of  Irish  revo- 
lution. Even  had  its  determination  to  be  non- 
political  been  more  deeply  rooted  than  it  prob- 
ably was,  there  were  forces  at  work  which  would 
have  undermined  it,  or  which  would  have  ap- 
plied to  their  own  purposes  the  stimulus  of  the 
language  movement. 

As  has  been  observed  in  the  preceding  chap- 
ter, a  vein  of  revolution  underlies  all  Irish  his- 
tory, outcropping  when  circumstances  offer  a 
favourable  opportunity,  or  when  chance  provides 
it  with  a  sufficiently  attractive  policy.  The  lan- 
guage movement  provided  such  an  opportunity. 
There  was  already  in  existence  another  body, 
the  Gaelic  Athletic  Association,  akin  to  the  Gael- 
ic League  in  its  inspirations,  but  operating  in 
the  realms  of  sport,  and  avowedly  political  in  its 
nature.  Its  object  was  to  check  Anglicisation  by 
reviving  the  old  Gaelic  games.  Archbishop 
Croke  gave  the  new  movement  his  blessing  In 
these  words,  written  in  1884,  the  year  of  its 
foundation ; 


18  IDEALISM  AWAKES 

"  If  we  continue  travelling  for  the  next  score 
years  in  the  same  direction  that  we  have  been 
going  in  for  some  time  past,  condemning  the 
sports  that  were  practised  by  our  forefathers, 
effacing  our  national  features  .  .  .  and  putting 
on  with  England's  stuff  and  broadcloths  her 
*  masher'  habits  and  such  effeminate  follies  as 
she  may  recommend,  we  had  better  at  once  ab- 
jure our  nationality,  clap  our  hands  for  joy  at 
the  sight  of  the  Union  Jack  and  place  l  Eng- 
land's bloody  red'  triumphantly  above  the 
green. ' ' 

The  Irishman,  an  organ  of  the  physical  force 
party,  thus  endorsed  the  archiepiscopal  senti- 
ments : 

"If  any  two  purposes  should  go  together, 
they  ought  to  be  politics  and  athletics  .  .  .  the 
exigencies  of  our  situation  force  us  into  a  per- 
petual war  with  England.  .  .  .  While  fighting 
the  enemy  in  the  by-ways  which  are  called  con- 
stitutional, we  must  also  maintain  a  certain  de- 
gree of  readiness  to  meet  our  enemy  in  the  field 
when  the  occasion  offers. ' '  * 

In  pursuance  of  this  patriotic  policy  the  As- 
sociation bans  British  soldiers  or  Irish  police- 
men, and  has  placed  itself  out  of  communion 
with  the  Irish  Amateur  Athletic  Association 
and  similar  bodies.  In  the  "Irish  Year  Book" 

*  Irishman,  December,  1884. 


THE  SEPAEATIST  EEVIVAL        19 

for  1906  schools  which  confine  themselves  to 
hurling  and  Irish  football  are  lauded  for  their 
patriotism,  while  those  who  practise  cricket  and 
such  foreign  games  are  held  up  to  reprobation 
as  decadent  and  anti-national. 

It  is  easy  to  see  how  Gaelic  League  and  Gael- 
ic Athletic  Association,  both  finding  their  sanc- 
tion in  the  remote  national  past,  should  be 
drawn  together,  and  how  the  more  forceful  body- 
should  become  the  dominating  influence,  both 
being  guided,  more  or  less  unconsciously,  by  the 
underlying  revolutionary  forces.  In  this  con- 
nection it  is  important  to  observe  that  the  Gaelic 
League  has  drawn  financial  aid  from  such  bod- 
ies as  the  Clan-na-Gael  and  the  American  Or- 
der of  Hibernians. 

Within  a  few  years  there  came  about  a  Sep- 
aratist revival  in  Ireland,  manifesting  itself  in 
varying  forms  but  with  a  very  definite  and  sin- 
gle purpose.  That  it  was  in  the  main  intellec- 
tual and  literary  is,  of  course,  due  to  the  inspi- 
ration of  the  Gaelic  League.  Where  it  marked 
an  advance  upon  its  parent  was  that  it  admitted 
politics,  and  did  not  shrink,  in  some  societies, 
from  hints  of  physical  force.  Thus  the  Literary 
Societies  which  sprang  up,  mainly  in  Dublin, 
Cork,  and  Belfast,  only  took  politics  as  a  side 
line,  as  ma"  -  be  seen  in  the  columns  of  the  Shan 


20  IDEALISM  AWAKES 

Van  Vocht,  a  monthly  journal  which  was  pub- 
lished in  Belfast  in  the  closing  years  of  the 
last  century.  The  Young  Ireland  Society,  on 
the  other  hand,  while  it  posed  as  a  movement  of 
intellectuals,  had  for  its  avowed  object : 

"To  hasten  the  day  when  the  flag  for  which 
patriots  suffered  and  martyrs  died  may  float 
triumphantly  over  an  Ireland  free  for  ever  from 
English  rule  and  domination"  (Annual  Eeport, 
January,  1904). 

The  Dungannon  Clubs  and  the  Daughters  of 
Erin  Societies  were  extreme  in  their  doctrine, 
short  in  their  lives,  and  singularly  disgraceful 
in  their  methods.  Their  literature  was  obscene, 
and  they  were  chiefly  remarkable  as  having  been 
the  instruments  through  which  Sinn  Fein  con- 
ducted its  campaign  against  recruiting  in  the 
early  years  of  the  century. 

Perhaps  the  most  interesting  of  the  bodies 
which  sprang  from  the  Gaelic  League  was 
'  *  Cumann  na  nGaedheal, ' '  which  was  an  organi- 
sation in  which  were  combined  many,  if  not  all, 
of  the  clubs  above  mentioned.  Its  interest  to  a 
great  extent  lies  in  this,  that  it  brings  us  face  to 
face  with  Mr.  Arthur  Griffith,  to  whose  teaching 
it  owed  its  existence.  It  reflected  the  phase  of 
his  political  evolution  through  which  he  was 
passing.    It  was  Separatist  in  its  aims,  intellec- 


CUMANN  NA  nGAEDHEAL  21 

tual  in  its  inspirations,  and  educational  in  its 
methods.  In  this  it  took  its  tone  largely  from 
the  United  Irishman,  a  journal  established  in 
1899,  with  Mr.  Griffith  as  editor,  by  some  Dub- 
lin Separatists. 

We  are  here  in  the  middle  of  the  transition 
period  from  the  Gaelic  League  to  Sinn  Fein. 
The  process  of  evolution  had  begun,  and  can  be 
traced  in  the  columns  of  the  United  Irishman, 
but  it  had  not  reached  its  full  development.  Al- 
though Mr.  Arthur  Griffith  had  set  himself  defi- 
nitely political  aims  of  a  Separatist  tendency, 
the  propagandist  methods  of  his  paper  were  still 
very  largely  those  of  the  Gaelic  League.  In  his 
coadjutor,  Mr.  William  Eooney,  he  had  a  man 
of  less  ability  indeed  than  Thomas  Davis,  the 
poet  of  the  Young  Ireland  movement,  but  of  sim- 
ilar character  and  with  the  additional  qualifi- 
cation that  he  was  an  accomplished  Irish  schol- 
ar. This  combination  of  hard-headed  National- 
ism and  scholarly  passion  was  fruitful.  The 
United  Irishman,  as  has  been  said  by  an  histo- 
rian of  the  movement,  acted  both  as  its  secretary 
and  organiser;  got  into  touch  with  every  liter- 
ary or  political  club  of  Separatist  leanings,  and 
federated  them  in  the  Cumann  na  nGaedheal. 

But  still  the  movement  hung  fire.  It  had  its 
goal,  it  had  found  its  spiritual  inspiration,  it  had 


22  IDEALISM  AWAKES 

stirred  the  imagination  of  the  youths  of  Ireland, 
it  had  won  the  sympathy  and  support  of  under- 
ground revolution,  but  it  still  lacked  motive 
force.  It  was  bitterly  critical  of  the  constitu- 
tional Nationalists,  but  destructive  criticism 
alone  can  never  maintain  a  party,  much  less  in- 
spire revolutionary  action.  Even  the  cry  of 
Separation  was  not  enough.  It  had  been 
preached  before  so  often,  and  had  been  attempt- 
ed with  results  so  disastrous,  that  it  had  become 
almost  academic.  Something  more  practical 
was  needed.  Home  Eule,  though  perhaps  only 
an  unsatisfying  compromise,  was  at  least  a 
practical  and,  more  important,  practicable  sug- 
gestion. If  that  compromise  were  to  be  turned 
down  it  could  only  be  in  favour  of  some  other 
alternative  equally  practicable  and  more  in  tune 
with  Ireland's  real  aspirations. 

Everything  pointed  to  the  necessity  of  pro- 
ducing a  constructive  policy.  In  1902  Mr.  Eoo- 
ney  died  and  the  movement  lost  the  support  of 
his  literary  and  romantic  enthusiasm.  The  Cu- 
mann  na  nGraedheal  had  done  all  it  could  do, 
it  had  paved  the  way,  but  could  not  start  the 
traffic  along  it.  There  were  signs  of  approach- 
ing dissolution  in  the  Unionist  Party.  It  was 
breaking  up  on  the  question  of  Tariff  Eeform, 
the  popularity  of  the  war  which  had  carried  it 


SEEKING  A  PROGRAMME  23 

into  office  in  1900  was  on  the  wane,  it  seemed 
probable  that  the  next  election  would  once  more 
find  Ireland  able  to  renew  her  demands  with 
some  prospects  of  success. 

Though,  as  indeed  is  natural,  it  is  not  men- 
tioned by  Sinn  Fein  writers  in  this  connection, 
it  is  possible  that  the  passing  of  the  Land  Pur- 
chase Act  was  not  without  its  influence  upon  the 
development  of  the  Sinn  Fein  idea.  The  Act 
was  a  great  one  and  very  popular,  possibly  the 
greatest  opportunity  ever  offered  to  an  agri- 
cultural people.  It  has  made  over  a  quarter 
of  a  million  tenants  owners  of  their  holdings,  at 
instalment  rates  for  purchase  less  than  their 
former  judicial  rents.  It  may  be  that  to  the  ene- 
mies of  Anglicisation  this  opened  up  alarming 
vistas  of  Anglo-Hibernian  friendship.  James 
Connolly,  though  he  admits  the  benefits  con- 
firmed by  the  Act,  invariably  strives  to  belittle 
the  share  of  Great  Britain  in  the  transaction 
by  maintaining  that  it  was  nothing  but  an  act, 
and  not  a  complete  act,  of  restitution. 

Whether  the  passing  of  the  Wyndham  Act 
had  any  influence  on  Mr.  Griffith's  mind  or  not, 
the  other  factors  made  it  evident  that  without 
a  constructive  and  operative  programme  the 
new  Nationalism  would  be  purely  platonic,  and 
Ireland's    future    would   be    directed   by   the 


24  IDEALISM  AWAKES 

Constitutional  Party  with  the  certain  loss  of 
the  true  national  idea. 

The  problem  he  had  to  solve  was  this — to  se- 
cure for  Ireland  legislative  freedom,  and  to  se- 
cure it  by  extra-parliamentary  action.  His 
school  objected  to  parliamentary  action  on  va- 
rious grounds,  the  most  obvious  being  that  any 
concessions  that  could  be  obtained  by  parlia- 
mentary methods  would  be  in  the  nature  of  a 
compromise  which  would  fall  short  of  Ireland's 
ambitions  and  requirements.  Although  the  most 
obvious,  this  was  far  from  being  the  most  seri- 
ous objection.  Infinitely  more  grave  was  the 
consideration  that,  by  appealing  to  a  British 
Parliament,  Ireland  tacitly  abandoned  imper- 
ishable rights.  Even  were  Parliamentarianism 
effective,  which  it  had  not  been  and  was  not  like- 
ly to  be,  the  mere  presence  of  Irish  members  at 
Westminster  constituted  an  acceptance  of  the 
Act  of  Union  and  of  the  authority  of  the  Brit- 
ish Parliament  to  legislate  for  Ireland.  Not 
only  that ;  it  had  also  diverted  the  mind  of  the 
people  to  political  action  in  a  foreign  land  and 
away  from  the  historic,  literary,  and  economic 
realities  of  their  own.  Political  contact  dulled 
the  clear-cut  edge  of  Irish  Nationalism  and  pro- 
moted that  Anglicisation  of  Ireland  which  was 
the  danger  most  of  all  to  be  averted. 


A  LESSON  FEOM  HUNGARY        25 

What  form,  then,  should  that  extra-parlia- 
mentary action  assume!  Not  force.  Mr.  Ar- 
thur Griffith  was  too  coldly  intellectual  and  too 
clear-sighted  to  think  that  force  was  a  prac- 
ticable remedy.  Nor  had  he  at  that  time,  though 
Separatist  in  his  ideals,  formulated  in  his  prac- 
tical mind  the  conception  of  an  Irish  Republic. 
For  the  moment  the  Constitution  of  1782  would 
satisfy  his  aims,  provided  that  the  new  Parlia- 
ment should  be  not  only  the  Parliament  of 
Grattan,  but  a  Parliament  far  more  infused  with 
the  old  traditions  and  the  pure  spirit  of  Irish 
nationality. 

Groping  after  a  solution  which  would  avoid  a 
hopeless  appeal  to  force,  he  published  scattered 
articles  in  the  United  Irishman  on  Austro-Hun- 
garian  relations.  From  these,  in  1904,  emerged 
a  connected  series  of  articles  under  the  title  of 
"The  Resurrection  of  Hungary."  In  these  ar- 
ticles he  described  the  parallelism  between  the 
position  of  Hungary  and  Ireland,  showed  how 
the  former  had  forced  her  freedom  from  Aus- 
tria, and  pointed  his  countrymen  in  the  same 
direction. 

This  practical  policy  at  once  gave  vitality  to. 
the  spirit  which  was  lying  dormant  in  the  new 
Nationalism.  It  was  what  Young  Ireland,  Cu- 
mann  na  nGaedheal,  the  Dungannon  Clubs,  the 
Daughters  of  Erin,  and  every  Separatist  or- 


26  IDEALISM  AWAKES 

ganisation  in  Ireland  had  been  waiting  for.  In 
no  long  time  they  became  fused  into  a  single 
organisation,  Sinn  Fein,  "Ourselves  Alone." 
Here,  they  believed,  they  had  found  the  road  to 
liberty,  avoiding  constitutionalism  on  the  one 
hand  and  armed  revolution  on  the  other. 

And  Eevolution,  which  did  not  shrink  from 
arms,  waited  in  the  background  and  watched. 


CHAPTEE  ni 

SINN   EEIN 

"Leabhab  na  h-Eireann,"  or  "Irish  Year 
Book,"  is  a  product  of  Sinn  Fein,  issued  by  a 
Publication  Committee,  of  which  in  1918  Mr. 
Arthur  Griffith  was  Chairman.  The  following 
description  of  Sinn  Fein,  published  in  1909,  is 
authoritative : 

"Sinn  Fein 

Literally — c Ourselves.'  The  title  and  expres- 
sion of  a  movement  which  denies  the  lawful 
existence  of  the  incorporating  Union  in  contra- 
distinction to  Unionism  and  Parliamentarian- 
ism.*    Sinn  Fein  declares  Ireland  to  be  by  nat- 

*  In  the  same  issue  Parliamentarianism  is  thus  defined : 
1 '  The  name  applied  to  the  policy  adopted  by  that  party  in  Ire- 
land which  agrees  with  Unionism  in  acknowledging  the  validity 
of  the  Act  of  Union  and  accepting  the  supremacy  of  the  Brit- 
ish Parliament  over  Irish  affairs,  but  which  advocates  the 
erection  of  a  central  elective  local  governing  body  in  Ireland. 
To  secure  this  it  believes  in  action  in  the  British  Parliament. ' ' 
It  will  be  observed  that  the  title  "  Nationalist ' '  is  not  applied 
to  that  party. 

27 


28  SINN  FEIN 

ural  and  constitutional  right  a  Sovereign  State, 
and  teaches  that  the  election  of  Irishmen  to 
serve  in  the  British  Parliament  is  treason  to 
the  Irish  State,  as  no  lawful  power  exists,  has 
existed,  or  can  exist  in  that  Parliament  to  leg- 
islate for  Ireland.  It  advocates  the  withdrawal 
of  the  Irish  representatives  from  Westminster, 
and  the  formation  in  Ireland  of  a  voluntary 
legislature  endowed  with  the  moral  authority 
of  the  Irish  nation." 
The  Constitution  is  then  quoted  as  follows : — 
' l  The  object  of  Sinn  Fein  is  the  re-establish- 
ment of  the  Independence  of  Ireland. 

' i  The  object  of  the  Sinn  Fein  policy  is  to  unite 
Ireland  on  this  broad  national  platform:      lst.Q\ 
That  we  are  a  dvstinct  nation;  2nd.  That  we 
will  not  make  any  voluntary  agreement  with 
Great  Britain  until  Great  Britain  keeps  her  own 
compact  which  she  made  by  the  Eenunciation 
Act   of   1783,   which   enacted   'that  the   right 
claimed  by  the  people  of  Ireland  to  be  bound 
only  by  laws  enacted  by  His  Majesty  and  the 
Parliament  of  that  Kingdom  is  hereby  declared 
to  be  established,  and  ascertained  for  ever,  and 
shall,  at  no  time  hereafter,  be  questioned  or 
questionable. '    3rd.  That  we  are  determined  to^ 
make  use  of  any  powers  we  have,  or  may  hav^g^) 
at  any  time  in  the  future,  to  work  for  our  own 


THE  CONSTITUTIONAL  BASIS      29 

advancement,  and  for  the  creation  of  a  pros- 
perous, virile  and  independent  nation. 

"That  the  people  of  Ireland  are  a  free  people 
and  that  no  law  made  without  their  authority 
or  consent  is,  or  ever  can  be,  binding  on  their 
conscience. 


"That  national  self-development  through  the 
recognition  of  the  duties  and  right  of  citizenship 
on  the  part  of  the  individual  and  by  the  aid  and 
support  of  all  movements  originating  from 
within  Ireland,  instinct  with  national  tradition 
and  not  looking  outside  Ireland  for  the  accom- 
plishment of  its  aims,  is  vital  to  Ireland. ' ' 

Before  passing  on,  one  observation  has  to  be 
made  on  the  wording  of  Clauses  1  and  2  of  this 
Constitution.  They  are  as  they  stand  out  of 
harmony  with  one  another,  the  first  claiming 
independence,  section  2  of  the  second  speaking 
of  a  "voluntary  agreement' '  with  Great  Britain 
subject  to  her  adhesion  to  the  Eenunciation  Act 
of  1783,  which  elsewhere  Mr.  Griffith  speaks  of 
as  a  "  Treaty. ' '  The  reason  is  that  the  wording 
of  these  clauses  represents  a  compromise  be- 
tween the  founders  of  Sinn  Fein.  One  section 
favoured  independence  pure  and  simple  and 
complete;  another,  including  Mr.  Griffith,  de- 


SO  SINN  FEIN 

sired  to  base  the  movement  on  the  Grattan  Con- 
stitution as  it  existed  after  the  passing  of  the 
Benunciation  Act.  This  is,  however,  now  of 
merely  academic  interest.  Sinn  Fein  has  long 
passed  out  of  the  phase  of  compromise.  "The 
policy  of  Sinn  Fein  to-day,"  says  Mr.  O'Hegar- 
ty*  in  this  present  year,  "is  the  old  Sinn  Fein 
policy  with  two  alterations.  In  the  first  place,  it 
is  based  frankly  on  separation,  with  no  mention 
of  the  Constitution  of  1782 ;  and  in  the  second 
place  its  immediate  objective  is  the  Peace  Con- 
ference. ' ' 

It  is  probable  that  Mr.  Arthur  Griffith  did  not 
contemplate  a  development  so  rapid  and  ex- 
treme when,  in  a  speech  of  great  length  and, 
despite  many  inaccuracies,  of  great  ability,  he 
unfolded  his  plan  at  the  first  annual  Convention 
of  the  National  Council  in  November,  1905.  He 
is  too  coldly  intellectual,  too  lacking  in  warmth 
of  passion  or  sympathy,  to  be  a  revolutionary 
chief.  He  is  one  of  those  who  can  construct  rev- 
olutions, but  who  cannot  conduct  or  control 
them.  Mainly  perhaps  from  his  natural  bent, 
partly  perhaps  from  tactical  prudence,  he  pre- 
sented Sinn  Fein  as  a  means  for  social  and  eco- 
nomic reform  to  be  attained  through  political  in- 

*  Mr.  O  'Hegarty  claims  to  write  with  authority,  as  having 
been  a  member  of  the  ' '  National  Council ' '  formed  by  Mr.  Grif- 
fith, of  the  Executives  of  the  Cumann  na  nGaedheal,  Dungannon 
Clubs,  and  Sinn  Fein  itself  until  1911. 


ECONOMIC  POLICY  31 

dependence,  which  could  best  and  most  consist- 
ently be  achieved  by  extra-parliamentary  ac- 
tion. And  most  of  all  he  insisted  that  all  re- 
forms, social,  economic,  or  political,  should  be 
inspired  by  and  based  upon  the  spirit  of  nation- 
ality. Thus  in  industrial  matters  he  denounced 
Free  Trade.  "It  does  not  matter  that  all 
Europe  has  rejected  it.  England  still  holds  on, 
and  because  England  holds  on,  Ireland  under 
the  English  system  of  education  perforce  con- 
cludes the  'as-good-and-as-cheap'  shibboleth 
must  be  a  gospel.  With  the  remainder  of  Eng- 
land's impositions  and  humbugs  we  must  bun- 
dle it  out  of  the  country. ' '  To  Mr.  Griffith  Free 
Trade  is  not  only  economically  unsound,  but  it  is 
nationally  disastrous  because  it  destroys  the 
idea  of  separate  nationality.  There  is  no  inter- 
nationalism about  Mr.  Arthur  Griffith.  As  the 
apostle  of  national  economics  he  holds  up  Fred- 
erick List,  "the  man  who  thwarted  England's 
dream  of  the  commercial  conquest  of  the  world, 
and  who  made  the  mighty  confederation  before 
which  England  has  fallen  commercially,  and  is 
falling  politically — Germany."  He  deplores  the 
predominance  of  agriculture  and  the  neglect  of 
manufacturing  industry  in  Ireland  not  only  on 
economic  grounds,  but  because,  by  making  her 
dependent  on  foreign  supplies,  it  impairs  her 
spirit   of  independent  nationalism.    He  rests 


32  SINN  FEIN 

his  indictment  of  the  education  system  mainly 
on  it&  anti-national  character.  "Education  in 
Ireland,"  he  declares,  "encumbers  the  intellect, 
chills  the  fancy,  debases  the  soul,  and  enervates 
the  body — it  cuts  off  the  Irishman  from  his  tra- 
dition and  by  denying  him  a  country  debases 
his  soul,  it  stores  his  mind  with  lumber  and  non- 
sense, it  destroys  his  fancy  by  depriving  him  of 
tradition,  and  enervates  his  body  by  denying 
him  physical  culture. ' '  As  proof  that  the  funds 
provided  for  Irish  education  are  "invested  to 
the  children's  moral  and  national  destruction,' ' 
he  says  that  from  the  primary  schools  come  re- 
cruits for  the  British  Army  and  Navy,  and  he 
describes  the  Irishman  who  joins  the  Army, 
Navy,  or  Eoyal  Irish  Constabulary  as  "neces- 
sarily, from  that  moment,  the  active  enemy  of 
his  country. ' '  * 

There  are  many  other  counts  in  the  indict- 
ment ;  no  branch  of  Irish  affairs,  indeed,  escapes 
inclusion.    But  enough  perhaps  has  been  given 

*  In  this  Mr.  Griffith  does  an  injustice.  This  is  hardly 
consistent  with  facts.  The  Irish  Independent,  May  15th,  1905, 
contained  a  letter  from  Mr.  Seamus  Macmanus,  formerly  a 
school  teacher  and  prominent  member  of  the  Gaelic  League, 
which  contains  this  passage :  ' '  The  Irish  youth  who  quits 
school  without  realising  his  duties  as  a  rebel,  is,  or  should  be, 
a  discredit  to  his  schoolmaster.  .  .  .  He  felt  his  conscience  easy 
in  the  knowledge  that  his  salary  was  well  and  easily  earned,  so 
far,  at  least,  as  the  stirring  of  discontent  and  the  dissemina- 
tion of  rebellious  opinions  was  concerned.'7 


NATIONAL  LIFE  33 

to  show  its  tendency.  Its  basic  doctrine  is  po- 
litical. Though  Mr.  Griffith  expresses  the  belief 
that  the  elimination  of  the  British  connection 
would  result  in  greater  material  progress,  he 
clearly  attaches  equal,  if  not  indeed  greater,  im- 
portance to  the  moral  and  spiritual  results  which 
would  proceed  from  the  awakening  of  the  na- 
tional idea.  Self -centralisation,  springing  from 
and  issuing  in  self-reliance,  is  the  keystone  of 
his  doctrine. 

It  is,  however,  of  less  importance  to  consider 
the  objects  at  which  he  aimed  than  the  methods 
by  which  he  proposed  to  attain  them.  Other 
men  than  he  had  thought  the  same  thoughts, 
though  not  perhaps  with  such  definite  conscious- 
ness, and  certainly  without  the  same  conviction 
that  the  material  and  political  were  so  closely 
intertwined.  But  what  distinguishes  him  from 
them  is  this — that  while  recognising  the  futility 
of  physical  force  he  still  absolutely  rejects  that 
which  was  regarded  as  its  only  alternative — 
constitutional  action — as  treason  to  Ireland. 
Parliamentary  action  being  therefore  barred,  he 
directed  his  countrymen  along  the  paths  by 
which  Hungary,  Finland,  and  Poland  had  won 
to  the  freedom  they  could  not  reach  by  force  of 
arms.  Ireland  has  to  construct  a  national  life 
outside  the  range  of  British  administration. 
It  would  not  be  possible  at  once  to  withdraw 


34  SINN  FEIN 

the  children  of  Ireland  from  the  National 
Schools,  but  they  might  gradually  be  absorbed 
into  the  schools  of  the  Irish  Christian  Brothers, 
or  into  voluntary  schools,  to  be  created  and  sup- 
ported by  the  Irish  people  throughout  the  world. 
Secondary  and  University  education  would  have 
to  be  reformed  on  similar  lines,  the  lines  laid 
down  by  Kossuth.  As  Hungary  did,  so  should 
Ireland  do  in  matters  of  law.  There  is  no  pow- 
er to  compel  Irishmen  at  variance  with  one  an- 
other to  settle  their  disputes  in  British  law 
courts.  Why  then  should  they  do  so?  Let  Ire- 
land establish  her  own  Courts  of  Arbitration, 
in  which  no  barristers  or  solicitors  should  be 
allowed  to  practise  ' '  who  had  devoted  their  time 
to  hawking  their  souls  for  sale"  in  the  Four 
Courts,  or  who  did  not  renounce  their  practice 
in  foreign  Courts.  Papineau  and  Deak  had 
tried  the  plan  in  Canada  and  Hungary,  why  not 
adopt  it  in  Ireland?  Thus  Ireland  should  boy- 
cott British  goods  and  the  armed  forces  of  the 
Crown.  She  should  refuse  to  pay  taxes,  not 
necessarily  in  a  way  to  offend  the  law,  but  by 
self-denial,  by  refusing  to  drink  whiskey  or  oth- 
er alcoholic  liquor,  thus  depriving  England  of 
half  her  Irish  revenue.  The  banking  system  of 
Ireland  could  be  broken  by  Kossuth's  expedient 
of  establishing  a  patriotic  National  Bank,  which 


NATIONALIST  HELOTS  35 

lent  its  funds  to  the  Hungarian  people,  not  to 
the  Austrian  Government.  But  over  and  above 
all  else,  the  Irish  people  should  refuse  to  send 
representatives  to  the  British  House  of  Com- 
mons. 

Too  much  attention  cannot  be  devoted  to  a 
consideration  of  the  last  plank  in  the  platform 
of  Sinn  Fein.  It  is  the  very  pith  and  kernel  of 
the  movement,  differentiating  it  absolutely  from 
the  Old  Nationalism.  The  Constitutional  Na- 
tionalist might  be  as  keen  on  material  reform 
as  any  Sinn  Feiner — though  it  has  in  fact  hap- 
pened that  the  stress  and  turmoil  of  political 
warfare  have  pushed  economic  and  social  re- 
form into  the  background  except  when,  as  in 
1880,  an  economic  question  gave  vitality  to  the 
political  movement.  But  the  Constitutional  Na- 
tionalist would  be  content  to  accept,  and  has  ac- 
cepted, material  reform  from  Great  Britain; 
he  has,  like  Sinn  Fein,  inveighed  against  British 
misgovernment,  but  he  has  committed  treason 
against  Ireland  in  asking  England  to  grant 
reforms.  "In  the  British  Liberal  as  in  the 
British  Tory,"  says  Mr.  Griffith,  "we  see  our 
enemy,  and  in  those  who  talk  of  ending  British 
misgovernment  we  see  the  helots.  It  is  not 
British  misgovernment,  but  British  government 
in  Ireland  good  or  bad,  that  we  are  opposed  to. " 


36  SINN  FEIN 

Sinn  Fein,  therefore,  is  not  an  offshoot  of 
constitutional  Nationalism;  it  is  a  distinct  or- 
ganism. It  is  only  because  both  parties  claim 
to  be  Nationalists  that  there  can  be  any  confu- 
sion of  thought  on  this  point.  When,  in  the  sen- 
tence above  quoted,  Mr.  Griffith  described  Brit- 
ish parties  as  ' '  enemies ' '  and  the  Irish  Party  as 
' 'helots,"  he  in  truth  grouped  them  into  a  com- 
mon hostility  to  Ireland,  for  if  his  view  be  cor- 
rect, the  Irish  helot  is  the  deadlier  enemy  of 
the  two,  because  by  every  effort  at  reform  he 
locks  the  shackles  more  firmly  upon  his  country. 
No  social  reform,  no  measure  of  self-govern- 
ment, however  generous,  gained  by  parliamen- 
tary action  or  recognition  of  the  British  connec- 
tion could  atone  for  the  intolerable  wrong  it 
would  inflict  upon  Ireland.  This  principle  lies 
at  the  root  of  the  Irish  question  as  it  exists  to- 
day. For  now  there  have  been  translated  into 
fact  doctrines  which,  when  they  were  spoken, 
seemed  to  the  exoteric  audience  fantastic  utter- 
ances which  marred  an  otherwise  attractive  pro- 
gramme if  they  were  seriously  meant,  but  which 
were  probably  not  really  serious. 

It  is  rather  curious  to  look  back  upon  the 
comments  made  on  the  New  Nationalism  in  its 
early  days.  The  Unionists  regarded  it,  as  one 
writer  said, ' '  with  mixed  feelings. ' '    The  politi- 


FLUTTEBED  DOVECOTES  37 

cal  side,  of  course,  they  loathed.  It  appeared  to 
them  to  be  mad,  so  mad  as  to  make  it  negligible, 
as  a  sort  of  window  dressing.  With  the  social 
and  economic  side  of  the  programme  they  had  a 
good  deal  of  sympathy,  it  being  a  cardinal 
point  of  their  creed  that  the  real  Irish  problem 
is  in  the  main  economic  and  not  political.  They 
liked  the  doctrine  of  self-help,  for  they  had  ever 
deplored  the  fact  that  Ireland  wasted  in  agita- 
tion time  which  might  be  better  devoted  to  in- 
dustry and  commerce.  They  regretted  that  Sinn 
Fein,  which  in  some  respects  saw  so  clearly 
what  were  Ireland's  needs,  was  falling  into  the 
same  error.  Moreover,  the  Unionists  were  not 
displeased  to  see  the  way  in  which  Sinn  Fein 
ridiculed  and  belaboured  the  Parliamentary 
Party.  Although  the  attack  was  delivered  from 
a  different  angle  and  the  criticism  was  inspired 
from  a  different  source,  they  enjoyed  the  attack 
and  agreed  with  the  criticism. 

The  position  of  the  parliamentary  National- 
ists was  much  more  embarrassing  and  less  com- 
fortable. Writhing  under  the  attacks,  they 
could  not  venture  on  open  reprisals.  Having  to 
keep  an  eye  upon  the  Irish  World  and  Mr.  Pat- 
rick Ford,  through  whom  their  war-chest  was 
largely  supplied,  they  could  not  denounce  the 
robust  Nationalism  of  Sinn  Fein,  while  they 


38  SINN  FEIN 

could  not  accept  it  without  a  humiliating  con- 
fession of  error  and  their  own  disappearance 
from  the  field.  Their  attitude  towards  Sinn 
Fein,  therefore,  was  rather  that  of  a  dignified 
wayfarer  towards  the  small  dog  who  yaps  at  his 
heels.  Thinking  it  beneath  his  dignity  to  kick,  he 
affects  a  lordly  indifference  the  while  he  feels  in 
fancy  the  creature's  teeth  meeting  in  his  leg. 

There  were,  indeed,  some  anxious  moments 
when  fancy  seemed  changing  into  certainty. 
The  readiness  of  the  parliamentary  National- 
ists to  accept  the  Councils  Bill,  proif ered  them 
by  Sir  Henry  Campbell-Bannerman  in  1907,  in- 
tensified the  hostility  of  Sinn  Fein  and  secured 
for  them  the  adhesion  of  many  seceders 
from  Mr.  Bedmond's  party,  among  them  Mr. 
Dolan,  the  Member  for  North  Leitrim,  and  Sir 
Thomas  Esmonde,  one  of  the  party  Whips.  Al- 
though the  Devolution  Bill  was  disowned  by  Mr. 
Eedmond  and  scornfully  rejected  by  a  Conven- 
tion of  the  United  Irish  League,  Sinn  Fein  had 
got  hold  of  a  weapon  which  it  wielded  with  great 
vigour  and  dexterity.  Mr.  Dolan  resigned  his 
seat  and  sought  re-election  against  Mr.  Bed- 
mond's  nominee.  He  was  defeated,  but  only  by 
some  800  or  900  votes.  Not  even  the  return  of 
Sir  Thomas  Esmonde  to  the  fold  could  disguise 
the  fact  that  the  official  Nationalists  had  only  a 


DECLINE  OF  SINN  FEIN  39 

small  majority,  in  a  constituency  where  they 
had  all  the  organisation  and  a  unanimous  Press, 
over  Sinn  Fein,  which  had  no  local  papers,  no 
organisation,  and  little  money. 

The  dignified  wayfarer  had  to  abandon  his 
contemptuous  indifference  and  kick  out;  and 
to  a  great  extent  verified  the  military  dictum 
that  the  offensive  is  the  best  defence.  It  was 
hinted  that  Sinn  Fein  was  tainted  with  anti- 
clericalism,  and  that  the  devout  fell  away. 

Inflated  by  the  Leitrim  election  Mr.  Griffith 
induced  Sinn  Fein  to  start  a  daily  paper.  It 
flickered  for  a  few  months  and  then  died  out. 
Those  who  worship  success  were  disheartened 
by  this  failure  and  deserted.  A  scheme  was 
mooted  by  some  half-hearted  Sinn  Feiners  to 
join  hands  with  Mr.  William  O'Brien,  who  was 
generally  at  loggerheads  with  his  party — the 
basis  of  the  compromise »being  that  though  there 
should  be  a  Parliamentary  Party  it  should  be 
under  the  control  of  a  National  Executive, 
which  should  decide  policy  and  tactics,  and 
among  the  latter  whether  the  party  should  at- 
tend Parliament  and,  if  so,  when  it  should  with- 
draw. The  scheme  was  prematurely  disclosed 
and  pleased  no  one.  The  advocates  of  the  policy 
of  "Thorough"  on  both  sides  denounced  it,  and 
none  more  heartily  than  the  Sinn  Fein  Execu- 


40  SINN  FEIN 

tive.  But  the  harm  was  done.  On  top  of  it  all 
came  the  General  Election  of  1910. 

As  in  1885  and  1892,  the  result  of  that  elec- 
tion gave  the  Irish  Parliamentary  Party  the 
balance  of  power  in  the  House  of  Commons,  and 
as  in  both  those  years  the  Liberal  Party  prom- 
ised Home  Eule.  Following  the  events  above 
described,  this  was  fatal  to  the  Sinn  Fein  idea. 
The  people  resumed  their  allegiance  to  Mr. 
Eedmond  and  the  rival  organisation  shrank  to  a 
shadow  of  its  former  self.  Though  the  central 
body  continued  to  meet,  it  had  few  branches 
to  control.  The  United  Irishman  continued  to 
appear,  but  it  was  comparatively  neglected  in 
the  interest  attached  to  the  Three  Years'  War 
for  Home  Eule  at  Westminster. 

The  parliamentary  players  got  all  the  lime- 
light and  the  rest  of  the  stage  was  in  the  shade. 
But  while  Sinn  Fein  thus  stood  idly,  a  super  in 
the  wings,  and  watched  the  leading  man  playing 
his  part  to  the  admiration  of  the  gallery,  its 
resolution  to  oust  him,  so  far  from  being  weak- 
ened by  its  downfall,  developed  in  intensity. 
Now  this  is  significant.  It  might  have  been  ex- 
pected that  the  set-back  it  had  received  would 
have  tended  to  create  in  Sinn  Fein  a  spirit  of 
compromise ;  that  it  would  have  endeavoured  to 
rehabilitate  itself  by  joining  in  the  Home  Eule 


THE  POSITION  IN  1913  41 

struggle  as  advocates  of  a  larger  measure  of 
self-government.  As  shown  above,  it  had  in 
1905  shown  some  disposition  to  accept  the  Con- 
stitution of  1783.  Sinn  Fein  might,  therefore, 
have  thrown  itself  into  the  fight  in  the  three 
years'  war,  from  1911-1914,  and  propounded 
that  measure  of  self-government  as  the  mini- 
mum which  Mr.  Redmond  could  accept,  without 
any  appearance  of  having  renounced  its  own 
original  views.  Ninety-nine  parties  out  of  a 
hundred  would  have  played  so  strong  a  card. 
Sinn  Fein  did  nothing  of  the  kind.  It  had 
dropped  Grattan's  Parliament  once  and  for  all, 
the  lower  its  fortunes  sank  the  stronger  grew  its 
vision  of  complete  independence,  and  it  dis- 
dained any  compromise  on  that  fundamental  ar- 
ticle of  its  faith,  even  though  compromise  might 
have  smashed  its  enemies,  the  " helots,' '  and  ad- 
hesion to  principle  promised  to  be  fatal  to  itself. 
Let  us  turn  back  Mr.  Wells's  time  machine 
and  observe  Sinn  Fein  as  it  was  at  the  beginning 
of  1913.  It  is  still,  in  the  words  of  Mr.  0  'Hegar- 
ty,  "the  evolution  of  a  national  philosophy 
rather  than  a  political  portent.  Its  principles 
and  policy  are  based  upon  ideas  rather  than 
rhetoric,  and  they  appeal  to  the  intellect  rather 
than  the  passions."  Its  doctrines  are  openly 
rebellious,  but  its  methods  are  not  illegal.  While 


42  SINN  FEIN 

the  political  side  of  its  programme  shocks  those 
who  are  well  affected  towards  British  rule,  and 
much  of  its  programme  appears  to  them  fantas- 
tic and  fanatical,  there  is  also  much  that  extorts 
their  assent,  while  its  moral  influence  commands 
their  respect. 

It  now  remains  to  examine  the  causes  which 
have  converted  such  an  organisation  into  a 
revolutionary  movement  that  openly  prescribes 
sporadic  assassination  and  selects  for  its  allies 
the  vilest  elements  of  society.  To  do  so  we  must 
leave  Sinn  Fein  at  this  point  and  trace  the 
growth  of  another  movement,  long  in  process  of 
gestation,  but  at  that  moment  quickening  into 
life. 


CHAPTER  IV 

ENTEK   JAMES   CONNOLLY 

With  the  possible  exception  of  Thomas  Em- 
mett,  there  is  not  in  the  whole  gallery  of  Irish 
revolution  a  more  commanding  figure  or  arrest- 
ing personality  than  that  of  James  Connolly. 
Whatever  view  be  taken  of  his  doctrines,  aims, 
and  methods,  he  compels  the  respect  due  to  a 
man  who,  while  battling  for  a  precarious  liveli- 
hood on  the  lowest  strata  of  society,  still  con- 
trives to  store  his  mind  with  knowledge ;  who  at 
the  age  of  twenty-six  gives  a  new  direction  to 
the  revolutionary  movement  in  his  own  country ; 
who  was  a  potent  force  in  the  propagation  of  a 
creed  that  is  now  convulsing  the  world;  who 
fought  with  ardour  and  ability  for  the  class  to 
which  he  belonged ;  and  who  finally  gave  his  life 
in  a  hopeless  struggle  for  the  principles  in  which 
he  believed.  The  history  of  the  industrial  move- 
ment with  which  we  are  now  concerned  is  com- 
promised in  the  twenty  crowded  vears  of  stormy 

43  . 


44         ENTER  JAMES  CONNOLLY 

life  which  lie  between  the  foundations  of  the 
Irish  Socialist  Republican  Party  by  James  Con- 
nolly in  1896  and  his  death  in  1916. 

That  is  not  to  say  that  Irish  industrialism 
had  not  a  history,  often  pitiful  and  occasionally 
violent.  There  were  guilds  and  societies  well 
back  in  the  eighteenth  century,  and  even  in  the 
days  before  the  Reformation,  and  more  than 
once  Parliament  was  constrained  to  make  in- 
quiry into  the  relation  between  masters  and 
men.  But  the  movement  had  no  great  vitality. 
Although  Connolly  observes  that  Labour  was 
well  organised  in  Dublin  in  the  opening  years  of 
the  nineteenth  century,  and  was,  indeed,  the 
backbone  of  Emmet's  rebellion,  it  made  so  little 
headway  towards  organisation  that  in  1895  the 
membership  of  the  Irish  unions  making  returns 
was  no  more  than  17,476,  divided  between  93 
unions.  There  were  other  unions  which  be- 
longed to  United  Kingdom  federations,  or  were 
branches  of  British  organisations,  but  all  told 
there  were  not  more  than  50,000  trade  unionists 
in  Ireland.  And  it  is  notable  that  in  his  book, 
Labour  in  Ireland,  Connolly  makes  little  or 
no  allusion  to  the  growth  or  decay  of  Irish  la- 
bour organisation  in  the  past,  except  the  casual 
reference  just  quoted.  And  he  himself  gives  as 
the  reason  that  his  purpose  was  not  to  write  a 


WEAKNESS  OF  IRISH  LABOUR     45 

history  of  labour  in  Ireland,  but  to  give  a  record 
of  labour  in  Irish  history. 

At  first  sight  the  distinction  is  not  startling, 
yet  it  contains  the  key  to  the  new  industrialism 
which  he  founded,  and  explains  why  he  launched 
his  movement  within  two  years  of  the  meeting 
of  the  first  Irish  Trade  Union  Congress,  which 
claimed  to  open  up  new  vistas  to  the  workers  of 
Ireland.  The  weak  point  in  that  development 
of  labour  was  to  him  that  it  lacked  the  idea  of 
Irish  Nationalism.  True,  it  had  asserted  the 
Irish  labour  movement's  independence  of  Brit- 
ish influence,  and  had  thereby  incurred  the 
displeasure  of  British  trade  unionism,  but  this 
independence  was  not  based  on  the  conception 
of  a  labour  movement  founded  on  Gaelic  ideas 
and  finding  its  origin  and  sanction  in  Gaelic 
institutions. 

Connolly  himself  explains  his  meaning  in  the 
course  of  articles,  first  published  in  the  Shan 
Van  Vocht*  and  afterwards  reprinted  under 
the  title  of  Erin's  Hope: 

"The  I.S.R.P.  was  founded  in  Dublin  in  1896 
by  a  few  working  men  whom  the  writer  had  suc- 
ceeded in  interesting  in  his  proposition  that  the 
two  currents  of  revolutionary  thought  in  Ire- 
land— the  Socialist  and  the  National — were  not 

*See  Chapter  III. 


46  ENTER  JAMES  CONNOLLY 

antagonistic,  but  complementary,  and  that  the 
Irish  Socialist  was  in  reality  the  best  Irish  pa- 
triot, but  in  order  to  convince  the  Irish  people 
of  that  fact  he  must  first  learn  to  look  inward 
upon  Ireland  for  his  justification,  rest  his  argu- 
ments upon  the  facts  of  Irish  history  and  be 
champion  against  the  subjection  of  Ireland  and 
all  that  it  implies.  That  the  Irish  question  was 
at  the  bottom  an  economic  question,  and  that  the 
economic  struggle  must  first  be  able  to  function 
nationally  before  it  could  function  internation- 
ally, and  as  Socialists  were  opposed  to  all  op- 
pression so  should  they  ever  be  foremost  in  the 
daily  battle  against  all  its  manifestations  social 
and  political." 

Were  the  practice  not  abhorrent  to  right- 
thinking  persons,  the  reader  might  almost  do 
well  to  turn  down  the  corner  of  this  page,  in  or- 
der that  the  above  passage  may  be  easy  for  ref- 
erence, so  much  does  it  reveal  that  is  new,  so 
much  does  it  explain  that  it  is  essential  to  un- 
derstand. The  very  name  of  the  book  in  which 
it  appeared  is  significant.  Erin's  hope  lay  not 
only  in  the  uplifting  of  her  proletariat  through 
Socialism,  but  through  Socialism  inspired  by 
Irish  ideas.  While  the  Socialists  of  other  lands 
are  bidden  to  look  wide  over  the  great  human 
family,  overleaping  the  artificial  lines  of  terri- 


SOWING  THE  SEEDS  47 

torial  boundaries,  and  studying  the  story  of  the 
race  rather  than  the  nation,  the  Irish  Socialist 
is  taught  to  concentrate  his  vision  on  his  own 
country  and  its  history,  its  traditions  and  its  in- 
stitutions, buried  under  the  detritus  of  centu- 
ries. It  is  our  task  to  trace  how  Connolly  based 
his  Socialism  on  Gaelic  traditions  and  institu- 
tions, and  propounded  revolutionary  methods 
as  the  result  of  his  study  of  Irish  history.  But 
the  real  importance  of  the  passage  lies  in  the  ex- 
planation it  gives  of  the  future  relations  which 
arose,  and  which  exist  to-day,  between  the  polit- 
ical and  bourgeois  and  the  economic  and  proleta- 
rian revolutionary  movements.  James  Connolly 
was,  indeed,  a  Sinn  Feiner,  preaching  its  funda- 
mental doctrine — though  applied  to  different 
objects — before  ever  Mr.  Arthur  Griffiths  began 
to  move. 

Thus  were  sown  in  1896  the  seeds  which  have 
sprung  up  into  armed  revolution  and  political 
complications  the  most  involved  and  distracting. 
How  they  came  to  be  sown  must,  therefore,  be 
understood,  and  to  reach  a  proper  understand- 
ing we  should  have  some  knowledge  of  the  fac- 
tors which  went  to  the  making  of  the  man  who 
sowed  them. 

Of  no  man  can  it  more  certainly  be  said  that 
he  takes  out  of  his  learning  very  much  what  he 
brings  to  it  than  of  James  Connolly.    By  he- 


48         ENTER  JAMES  CONNOLLY 

redity  he  was  a  rebel,  by  bitter  experience  he 
was  a  revolutionary,  by  his  environment  he  be- 
came a  Socialist.  His  uncle  was  a  Fenian,  and 
in  his  company  he  attended  meetings  of  extreme 
Nationalists  when  he  was  a  boy  in  Edinburgh. 
Thus  he  faced  the  vicissitudes  of  his  life  in  Scot- 
land with  a  strong  bias  towards  Nationalism  in 
its  insurrectionary  form.  And  what  vicissitudes 
they  were !  As  a  boy  of  eleven  he  worked  in  a 
bakery  until  his  health  gave  way,  and  then  he 
was  navvy,  pedlar,  and  sometimes  tramp,  until 
for  a  couple  of  comparatively  prosperous  years 
he  had  a  job  in  an  Edinburgh  factory.  Then  a 
return  to  his  native  Ireland,  and  back  again  to 
Edinburgh  to  take  up  the  work  of  a  dustman  un- 
der the  Corporation.  No  wonder  the  iron  en- 
tered his  soul  and  the  idea  of  political  insurrec- 
tion grew  into  revolutionary  hatred  of  his  condi- 
tions. 

Always  a  student,  Connolly  might  have  con- 
fined his  studies  to  Irish  literature  had  he  been 
in  Ireland.  Being  in  Scotland,  a  country  where 
philosophy  is  popular,  and  where  at  that  time 
it  happened  that  the  study  of  social  philosophy 
was  attracting  great  attention,  he,  by  a  natural 
process,  became  a  Socialist,  and  a  Socialist  of  the 
Marxian  school.  There  was  then  in  Edinburgh 
one  John  Leslie,  who  had  written  a  pamphlet 


EARLY  STRUGGLES  49 

in  which  the  Land  League  was  discussed  from 
the  standpoint  of  Socialistic  Labour,  and  its 
teaching  gave  direction  to  his  mind.  Thus  fall- 
ing under  Leslie 's  influence,  he  took  the  decisive 
step  of  his  life.  He  had  given  up  his  post  as 
dustman  in  order  to  stand  as  a  Socialist  candi- 
date for  the  Town  Council  of  Edinburgh;  was 
defeated,  and  being  out  of  work  resolved  to  go 
to  Chili  to  try  farming.  Leslie  persuaded  him 
to  cultivate  Socialism  in  Ireland  instead,  and 
accordingly  he  went  to  Dublin,  where  he  got 
work  as  a  navvy  in  some  big  drainage  opera- 
tions, and  afterwards  found  employment  as  a 
proofreader  on  a  Sunday  paper. 

Here,  then,  we  find  united  the  hereditary 
rebel,  the  convinced  Socialist,  the  man  embit- 
tered by  experience,  consumed  with  a  sympathy 
for  his  class,  less  vehement  in  expression  than 
his  future  coadjutor  Larkin,  but  not  the  less 
deadly  for  being  more  restrained.  This  short 
sketch  of  Connolly's  career  enables  us  to  under- 
stand what  lay  behind  the  Irish  Socialist  Re- 
publican Party. 

But  that  is  not  enough.  It  remains  to  exam- 
ine Connolly's  interpretation  of  Irish  history. 
It  need  not  be  examined  in  a  critical  spirit;  to 
do  so  indeed  would  be  a  grave  mistake.  For  the 
thing  that  matters  is  not  whether  Connolly's 


50         ENTEE  JAMES  CONNOLLY 

reading  of  it  were  true  or  false,  but  that  it  is  the 
version  which  he  gave  to  his  followers.  The 
writer,  therefore,  true  to  his  self-imposed  pur- 
pose, will  present  Connolly's  views  with  as  little 
comment  or  criticism  as  possible. 

Bringing  to  the  study  of  Irish  history  an  he- 
redity bent  towards  insurrectionary  methods, 
Connolly  brought  away  from  it  a  profound  con- 
tempt for  its  historians  and  an  ineradicable 
hostility  to  Nationalism  of  the  type  to  which  the 
last  four  generations  have  been  accustomed. 
When  he  objects  to  the  historians  that  they 
ignore  or  violate  the  dictum  of  Marx,  "that  in 
every  historical  epoch  the  prevailing  method  of 
economic  production  and  exchange,  and  the  so- 
cial organisation  necessarily  following  from  it, 
form  the  basis  upon  which  alone  can  be  ex- 
plained the  political  and  intellectual  history  of 
that  epoch,' '  he  makes  a  charge  to  which,  until 
recently,  the  historians  of  all  countries  are 
equally  open.  They  viewed  events  in  a  false 
perspective,  as  quite  probably  they  were  viewed 
by  those  who  took  part  in  them.  But  Connolly 
goes  further,  and  seems  to  regard  the  ignoring 
of  social  and  economic  phenomena  by  Irish  his- 
torians as  wilful  and  of  set  purpose.  Their  mis- 
reading of  Irish  history  appears  to  him  to  be 
due,  not  to  ignorance  of  the  true  functions  of 


BLIND  HISTOKIANS  51 

the  historian,  but  to  deliberate  treachery,  born 
of  the  instinct  of  self-preservation. 

The  conspiracy  had  its  starting-point  in  the 
dispersion  of  the  Clans  and  the  disappearace  of 
the  old  system  of  communal  land-ownership  in 
1649.  Until  the  final  victory  of  Cromwell  the 
basis  of  Irish  Society  rested  on  tribal  ownership 
of  land,  except  within  the  Pale,  and  consequent- 
ly when  the  tribes  went  to  war  against  England 
they  were  fighting  not  only  for  political  free- 
dom, but  for  their  land  as  well.  With  the  sup- 
pression of  the  tribal  or  clan  system  the  social 
and  economic  aspect  of  the  conflict  sank  out  of 
sight.  With  the  passing  of  the  tribal  system  and 
of  the  Chiefs  of  the  Clans,  the  direction  of  the 
patriotic  movement  fell  into  the  hands  of  the 
middle  class — for  the  aristocracy  were  only  pa- 
triotic so  long  as  they  feared  that  the  land  which 
was  theirs  by  confiscation  would  be  taken  from 
them — and  so  became  for  the  most  part  the 
idealised  expression  of  middle-class  interest.  On 
these  lines  was  Irish  patriotic  history  written, 
and  on  these  lines  did  Irish  patriotism  operate. 

"Hence,"  says  Connolly,*  "the  spokesmen 
of  the  middle-class,  in  the  Press  and  on  the  plat- 
form, have  consistently  sought  the  emasculation 
of  the  Irish  National  Movement,  the  distortion 

*  ' l  Lessons  of  History, "  p.  5. 


52  ENTER  JAMES  CONNOLLY 

of  Irish  history,  and,  above  all,  the  denial  of  all 
relation  between  the  social  rights  of  the  Irish 
tribes  and  the  political  rights  of  the  Irish  na- 
tion. It  was  hoped  and  intended  by  this  means 
to  create  what  is  termed  '  a  real  National  Move- 
ment,' i.e.,  a  movement  in  which  each  class 
would  unite  in  a  national  struggle  against  the 
common  enemy — England. ' ' 

It  is  not  difficult  to  see  how  such  a  policy 
might  inspire  a  constitutional  programme,  as  ac- 
cording to  Connolly  it  did,  but  he  goes  further 
and  sees  its  taint  even  in  revolutionary  move- 
ments. 

* '  During  the  last  hundred  years  every  gener- 
ation has  witnessed  an  attempted  rebellion 
against  British  rule.  Every  such  conspiracy  or 
rebellion  has  drawn  the  majority  of  its  adher- 
ents from  the  lower  orders  in  town  and  country, 
yet  under  the  inspiration  of  a  few  middle-class 
doctrinaires  the  social  question  has  been  rigor- 
ously excluded  from  the  field  of  action  to  be  cov- 
ered by  the  rebellion  if  successful ;  in  hopes  that 
by  such  exclusion  it  would  be  possible  to  concili- 
ate the  upper  classes  and  enlist  them  in  the 
struggle  for  freedom." 

As  a  result  they  failed — "a  warning  to  those 
who  neglect  the  vital  truth  that  successful  revo- 
lutions are  not  the  product  of  our  brains,  but 
of  ripe  material  conditions. ' ' 


SAESFIELD,  FOOL  OE  TEAITOE     53 

Connolly  writes  of  this  error  of  the  insurrec- 
tionists as  much  in  sorrow  as  in  anger;  when  he 
comes  to  describe  the  career  of  parliamentary 
Nationalism  his  anger  is  tempered  only  by  con- 
tempt. He  is  a  political  iconoclast,  shattering 
patriotic  reputations  ruthlessly  and  pouring 
ridicule  on  the  stock  arguments  and  most  telling 
catchwords  of  patriotic  orators.  There  is  no 
more  picturesque  figure  in  Irish  history  than 
that  of  Sarsfield;  he  has  become  a  legendary 
hero  of  Irish  Nationalism.  The  defence  of  Lim- 
merick,  when,  in  the  words  of  the  French  com- 
mandant, its  walls  could  be  "battered  down  with 
roasted  apples,' '  against  William  himself,  is 
regarded  as  a  national  epic.  Yet  of  Sarsfield 
and  his  men  Connolly  declares  that  "so  far 
from  the  paeans  of  praise  lavished  on  them  be- 
ing justified,  it  is  questionable  whether  a  more 
enlightened  or  patriotic  age  than  our  own  will 
not  condemn  them  as  little  better  than  traitors 
for  their  action  in  seducing  the  Irish  people 
from  their  allegiance  to  the  cause  of  their  coun- 
try's freedom  to  plunge  them  into  war  on  behalf 
of  a  foreign  tyrant. ' '  To  Connolly  the  William- 
ite  war  was  a  disaster,  not  because  the  Catholic 
King  was  defeated,  but  because  Ireland  took 
part  in  it  and  so  lost  the  chance  of  complete 
independence  while  "the  forces  of  their  oppres- 
sors were  rent  in  civil  war. ' ' 


54  ENTEE  JAMES  CONNOLLY 

It  had  this  further  disastrous  effect,  that  it 
ranged  the  leaders  of  both  parties  on  the  side  of 
feudalism.*  "The  so-called  patriotic  efforts  of 
the  Catholic  gentry  were  directed  to  the  conser- 
vation of  their  own  rights  of  property,  as 
against  the  right  of  the  English  Parliament  to 
interfere  with  or  regulate  such  rights.  The  so- 
called  Patriot  Parliament  in  Dublin  was,  in  real- 
ity, like  every  other  Parliament  that  ever  sat  in 
Dublin,  merely  a  collection  of  land-thieves  and 
their  lackeys;  their  patriotism  consisted  in  an 
effort  to  retain  for  themselves  the  spoils  of  the 
native  peasantry ;  the  English  influence  against 
which  they  protested  was  the  influence  of  their 
fellow-thieves  in  England  hungry  for  a  share  in 
the  spoil;  and  Sarsfield  and  his  followers  did 
not  become  Irish  patriots  because  of  their  fight 
against  King  William's  Government  any  more 
than  an  Irish  Whig  out  of  office  becomes  a 
patriot  because  of  his  hatred  to  the  Tories  who 
are  in." 

From  the  view-point  of  Connolly,  therefore, 
the  Williamite  war  loses  all  the  dignity  with 
which  it  has  been  invested  by  Irish  patriots. 
Sarsfield's  dying  words  at  Landen,  "Oh,  that 
this  blood  had  been  shed  for  Ireland/ '  became 
the  merest  "tosh,"  and  dishonest  tosh  at  that, 

*  Labour  in  Irish  History,  p.  17. 


FATAL  VALOUR  55 

for  the  shedding  of  it  would  only  have  served  to 
place  a  foreign  foot  upon  his  country's  neck  in 
order  that  he  might  enjoy  the  spoil  of  his  delud- 
ed fellow-countrymen.  The  only  importance  of 
the  struggle  which  ended  at  Limerick  in  1691 
lies  in  this — that  it  stereotyped  a  form  of  patri- 
otism, always  vicious,  and  fatal  where  it  was  not 
futile. 


CHAPTER  V 

LABOUR  AND   THE   UNION 

Three  events  make  the  eighteenth  century  no- 
table in  the  story  of  Irish  Nationalism — the  Pe- 
nal Laws,  Grattan  's  Parliament,  and  the  Act  of 
Union.  While  the  latter  event  is  the  starting- 
point  of  the  Parliamentary  Movement,  and 
Grattan 's  Parliament  represents  its  ideal,  the 
Penal  Laws  are  invoked  in  well-nigh  every 
speech  to  keep  the  flame  of  patriotism  alight. 
These  are  the  keynotes  of  the  war-song  of  Na- 
tionalism. Connolly,  on  the  other  hand,  dis- 
misses them  as  historical  incidents  having  no 
particular  bearing  on  the  Irish  question  as  he 
sees  it.  Such  importance  as  the  Penal  Laws 
possessed  arose  from  the  fact  that  they  helped 
to  place  the  manufacturing  business  of  the  coun- 
try in  the  hands  of  Protestants;  otherwise  he 
holds  them  to  be  of  purely  "posthumous  inter- 
est." They  are  indefensible,  but  to  denounce 
them  is  to  waste  time  and  even  some  sympathy. 
For  he  points  out  that  the  effect  of  the  Code  in 

56 


PENAL  LAWS  57 

impoverishing  the  Catholics  has  been  much 
over-rated. 

In  1763  a  Bill  was  introduced  in  the  Irish 
House  of  Commons  to  give  greater  facilities  to 
Protestants  wishing  to'  borrow  money  from 
Catholics,  which  would  indicate  that  the  op- 
pressed had  managed  to  thrive  under  the  Penal 
Laws.  And  Connolly  would  almost  seem  to  con- 
demn the  attention  which  has  been  given  to  these 
laws,  as  having  the  effect  of  distracting  atten- 
tion which  would  be  better  devoted  to  the  work- 
ing out  of  economic  laws  which  caused  infinitely 
greater  misery  and  hardship  to  the  people  irre- 
spective of  religion,  such  as  the  famine  of  1740, 
or  the  removal  of  the  embargo  on  the  admis- 
sions of  Irish  meat,  cattle,  butter,  and  cheese 
into  England.* 

"The  ' patriots'  who  occupied  the  public  stage 
in  Ireland  during  the  period  we  have  been  deal- 
ing with  never  once  raised  their  voices  to  protest 
against  such  social  injustice.  Like  their  imita- 
tors to-day  they  regarded  the  misery  of  the  Irish 
people  as  a  convenient  handle  for  political  agi- 
tation; and,  like  their  imitators  to-day,  they 
were  ever  ready  to  outvie  the  Government  in 
their  denunciation  of  all  those  who,  more  ear- 

*  The  effect  of  this  measure  was  so  to  enhance  the  price  of 
the  articles  as  to  make  tillage  comparatively  unprofitable,  with 
the  result  that  small  holders  were  evicted  to  establish  ranches. 


58  LABOUR  AND  THE  UNION 

nest  than  themselves,  sought  to  find  a  radical 
cure  for  such  misery. ' '  * 

In  this  general  condemnation  he  includes  men 
like  Lucas,  Molyneux,  and  Swift,  although  that 
great  man  had  penned  some  of  his  bitterest  sat- 
ires on  the  side  of  the  suffering  people.  Their 
agitation  for  the  repeal  of  Pc^ings'  Law  ap- 
pears to  Connolly  a  mere  beating  of  the  wind, 
dishonest  in  its  motive — though  the  dishonesty 
may  have  been  unconscious — and  entirely  futile 
for  its  purpose,  however  successful.  In  this,  of 
course,  he  runs  directly  counter  to  the  accepted 
belief  of  Home  Rule  Nationalism.  Poynings> 
Law  placed  Irish  legislation  under  the  control  of 
the  British  Parliament,  it  reduced  the  Irish 
Legislature  to  a  mere  debating  society.  It  is  a 
frequent  theme  of  Nationalist  oratory,  adorning 
many  a  speech  and  pointing  a  patriotic  moral. 
To  Connolly  it  mattered  not  a  jot  whether 
Poynings'  Law  were  repealed  or  not;  the  result 
to  Ireland  would  be  much  the  same.  Indeed  the 
only  difference  to  Ireland  lay  in  this,  that  were 
the  Law  repealed  the  people  would  be  plundered 
by  Irishmen;  while  it  remained  in  existence 
Englishmen  shared  in  the  plunder.  The  passage 
in  which  this  theory  is  expounded  merits  quo- 
tation as  typical  of  Connolly's  position. 

*  Labour  in  Irish  History,  p.  32. 


PATEIOTIC  THIEVES  59 

"In  course  of  time  the  section  of  land-thieves 
resident  in  England  did  claim  a  right  to  super- 
vise the  doings  of  the  adventurers  in  Ireland, 
and,  consequently,  to  control  their  Parliament. 
Hence  arose  Poynings'  Law  and  the  subordina- 
tion of  the  Dublin  Parliament  to  the  London 
Parliament.  Finding  this  subordinate  position 
of  their  Parliament  enabled  the  English  ruling 
class  to  strip  the  Irish  workers  of  the  fruits  of 
their  toil,  the  more  far-seeing  of  the  privileged 
class  in  Ireland  became  alarmed  lest  the  strip- 
ping process  should  go  too  far,  and  leave  noth- 
ing for  them  to  fatten  on. 

"At  once  they  became  patriots,  anxious  that 
Ireland — which,  in  their  phraseology,  meant  the 
ruling  class  in  Ireland — should  be  free  from  the 
control  of  the  Parliament  of  England.  Their 
pamphlets,  speeches  and  all  public  pronounce- 
ments were  devoted  to  telling  the  world  how 
much  nicer,  equitable,  and  altogether  more  de- 
lectable it  would  be  for  the  Irish  people  to  be 
robbed  in  the  interests  of  a  native-born  aristoc- 
racy than  to  witness  the  painful  spectacle  of 
that  aristocracy  being  compelled  to  divide  the 
plunder  with  its  English  rival. ' '  *  Perhaps,  he 
admits,  Swift  and  his  friends  did  not  confess 
even  to  themselves  that  this  was  the  basis  of 

*  Labour  in  Irish  History,  p.  34. 


60  LABOUR  AND  THE  UNION 

their  political  creed,  but  lie  feels  bound  to  ex- 
pose the  flimsy  sophistry  which  strives  to  im- 
part to  a  sordid,  self-seeking  struggle  the  ap- 
pearance of  a  patriotic  movement. 

As  with  Swift  and  Molyneux,  so  with  Grattan 
and  Flood,  the  "Two  Harries,"  as  they  are 
contemptuously  called  by  Connolly,  quoting  the 
words  of  a  street  ballad  written  at  the  time  of 
what  he  calls  the  "betrayal  of  the  Irish  Volun- 
teers." Grattan  is  "the  ideal  capitalist  states- 
man, his  spirit  was  the  spirit  of  the  bourgeoisie 
incarnate.  He  cared  more  for  the  rights  of 
property  than  for  human  rights  or  the  interests 
of  any  religion."  "The  eminently  respectable, 
anti-revolutionary,  religious  Mr.  Henry  Grattan 
was  at  heart  a  free  thinker,  free  lover,  and  epi- 
curean philosopher."  He  had  accepted  a  dona- 
tion of  £50,000  from  the  Government  for  his 
"patriotic"  services,  and  afterwards  "in  excess 
of  gratitude  for  this  timely  aid  repaid  the  Gov- 
ernment by  betraying  and  denouncing  the  Vol- 
unteers." 

Henry  Flood  fares  little  better.  "Flood,  the 
great  Protestant"  patriot — he  of  whom  Davis 
sings : 

Blesa  Henry  Flood,  who  nobly  stood 
By  us  through  gloomy  years — 

in  the  Irish  House  of  Commons  of  1763  fiercely 


GBATTAN'S  PAELIAMENT  61 

denounced  the  Government  for  not  killing 
enough  of  the  white  boys.*  He  called  it  "clem- 
ency. ' '  He  is  further  described  as  a  known  ene- 
my of  the  oppressed  peasantry  and  a  hater  of 
Catholics,  and  it  is  charged  against  him  that  he 
spoke  and  voted  in  favour  of  a  motion  to  pay 
the  expenses  of  an  army  of  10,000  British  sol- 
diers to  put  down  the  Revolution  in  America. 

Having  thus  stripped  from  these  protagonists 
of  self-government  the  halos  with  which  Na- 
tionalism has  invested  them,  Connolly  proceeds 
to  shatter  the  image,  constructed  by  popular 
fancy  and  historical  distortion,  of  the  constitu- 
tional system  they  brought  into  being.  The 
Constitution  of  1782  has  been  represented  as  an 
ideal  to  be  worked  for,  but  so  splendid  as  almost 
to  be  beyond  reasonable  hope  of  attainment.  It 
was  the  goal  of  O'Connell;  others,  claiming  to 
be  as  patriotic  as  he,  based  their  claim  on  de- 
mands less  extreme.  The  period  during  which 
Ireland  enjoyed  that  Constitution  is  depicted 
as  a  golden  age,  socially  and  economically.  Irish 
prosperity  was  advancing  by  leaps  and  bounds, 
owing  its  origin  to  the  free  Parliament,  and 
owing  its  end  to  the  Act  of  Union. 

*  A  secret  organisation,  very  powerful  in  the  South  of  Ire- 
land, so  called  from  wearing  white  shirts  as  a  disguise.  Their 
grievances  were  agrarian  and  their  method  ferocious. 


62  LABOUR  AND  THE  UNION 

Connolly  devotes  some  space  to  the  dissipa- 
tion of  the  latter  delusion.  In  the  first  place  he 
denies  that  Ireland  was  really  prosperous  at  all. 
In  1786  the  Munster  peasantry,  then  fighting 
against  tithes,  called  upon  the  Irish  Parliament 
to  help  them  in  their  misery,  plundered  by  the 
Protestant  clergy  in  the  form  of  tithes  and  by 
the  Catholic  clergy  in  the  name  of  dues.  Wages 
in  Meath  were  6d.  a  day  in  summer  and  4d.  in 
winter,  and  in  1796  the  advertisement  of  a 
Charity  Sermon  in  the  Parish  Chapel,  Meath 
Street,  Dublin,  stated  that  in  three  streets  in  the 
parish  of  St.  Catherine's  "2000  souls  had  been 
found  in  a  starving  condition." 

While  Connolly,  as  a  Socialist,  is  bound  to 
hold  that  the  economic  condition  of  Ireland  un- 
der Grattan's  Parliament  was  bad  because  of 
the  inadequate  share  of  Labour  in  the  wealth 
produced,  he  admits  that  from  the  capitalist 
standpoint,  taking  the  volume  of  wealth  pro- 
duced as  a  standard,  Ireland  was  during  this  pe- 
riod prosperous.  But  he  stoutly  denies  that  in 
any  but  an  infinitesimal  degree  was  this  pros- 
perity produced  by  Parliament.  The  establish- 
ment of  free  trading  relations  between  Great 
Britain  and  Ireland,  which  antedated  Grattan's 
Parliament  by  some  few  years,  was  contribu- 
tory to  it,  but  the  root  cause  lay  in  an  economic 


WHY  IEELAND  PROSPERED        63 

development  outside  the  power  of  Parliament  to 
create  or  destroy.  The  grant  of  parliamentary 
independence  to  Ireland  coincided  with  great 
mechanical  discoveries,  which  revolutionised 
manufacture,  and  by  reducing  the  cost  of  manu- 
factured goods  gave  an  enormous  stimulus  to 
trade.  Arkwright  invented  the  water-frame  in 
1769,  Hargreave  and  Crampton  followed  within 
the  next  decade  with  the  spinning  jenny  and 
mechanical  mule,  the  steam  engine  was  applied 
to  blast  furnaces  in  1788.  Domestic  industries 
gave  place  to  factories,  and  the  factories  were 
hard  set  to  supply  the  hosts  of  customers  at- 
tracted by  the  new  prices.  The  cotton  and  linen 
trades  trebled  their  output,  the  iron  trade  was 
doubled.  The  boom  held  during  the  life  of 
Grattan's  Parliament;  its  end  came  soon  after 
the  Union,  but  not  as  a  consequence  of  it. 

The  cause  of  the  slump,  as  of  the  boom,  was 
not  political,  but  economic.  As  the  inventor  had 
created  Irish  trade,  so  did  the  inventor  destroy 
it.  The  application  of  steam  not  only  revolu- 
tionised methods  of  manufacture,  but  it  diverted 
the  process  of  manufacture  to  British  factories. 
So  long  as  the  new  machinery  could  be  worked 
by  hand  Ireland  could  hold  her  own,  but  when 
steam  came  to  be  applied  to  the  service  of  in- 
dustry, the  possession  of  coal  weighted  the 


64  LABOUB  AND  THE  UNION 

scales  fatally  against  her.  During  the  debate  in 
the  Irish  Parliament  on  the  Union  Bill,  Mr.  Fos- 
ter stated  that  the  Irish  production  of  linen  was 
twice  as  great  as  that  of  Scotland — namely, 
47,000,000  yards  as  against  23,000,000— and  he 
attributed  this  to  the  fact  that  Ireland  had  a  na- 
tive Parliament.  By  the  year  1830,  the  single 
port  of  Dundee  exported  more  linen  than  the 
whole  of  Ireland,  and  this  melancholy  result  has 
been  attributed  to  the  Union.  Connolly  derides 
the  argument.  Scotland,  he  says,  like  Ireland, 
had  been  deprived  of  self-government.  Why 
then  had  Scottish  manufacturers  advanced  and 
Irish  declined?  Simply  because  Scotland  had 
coal  and  other  advantages  which  Ireland  lacked. 

Grattan's  Parliament  is  the  Mecca  of  Parlia- 
mentary Nationalism  as  the  Union  is  its  Hegira. 
Connolly  is  contemptuous  of  both. 

"The  theory  that  the  fleeting  ' prosperity'  of 
Ireland  was  created  by  the  Parliament  of  Grat- 
tan  is  only  useful  to  its  propagators  as  a  prop 
to  their  arguments  that  the  Legislative  Union 
between  Great  Britain  and  Ireland  destroyed 
the  trade  of  the  latter  country,  and  that,  there- 
fore, the  repeal  of  that  Union  would  lead  to  the 
re-establishment  of  Irish  manufacturers  on  a 
paying  basis.  The  fact  that  the  Union  placed 
all  Irish  manufacturers   upon   an   absolutely 


AN  AWKWAED  QUESTION  65 

equal  basis  legally  with  the  manufacturers  of 
England  is  usually  ignored,  or,  worse  still,  per- 
verted in  its  statement  so  as  to  leave  the  impres- 
sion that  the  reverse  is  the  case.  In  fact  many 
thousands  of  our  countrymen  still  believe  that 
English  laws  prohibit  mining  in  Ireland  after 
certain  minerals  and  the  manufacture  of  certain 
articles.  .  .  .  There  are  not,  and  have  not  been 
since  the  Union,  any  such  laws. ' '  * 

He  proceeds  to  suggest  the  application  of  the 
Socratic  method  by  any  student  anxious  to  pur- 
sue the  study  of  this  remarkable  controversy 
in  Irish  history.  Let  him,  he  says,  propound 
this  question  to  any  leading  exponent  of  Parlia- 
mentarianism : 

"Please  explain  the  process  by  which  the  re- 
moval of  Parliament  from  Dublin  to  London — 
a  removal  absolutely  unaccompanied  by  any 
legislative  interference  with  Irish  industry — 
prevented  the  Irish  capitalist  class  from  con- 
tinuing to  produce  goods  for  the  Irish  market." 

He  will,  he  proceeds,  get  no  logical  answer  to 
his  question — no  answer  that  any  reputable 
thinker  on  economic  questions  will  accept  for  a 
moment.  He  will  get  figures  of  exports  and  em- 
ployment— that  was  0 'Cornell's  method,  which 

*  Labour  in  Irish  History,  p.  45. 


66  LABOUE  AND  THE  UNION 

has  been  slavishly  copied  ever  since.  But  neither 
O'Connell  nor  his  successors  have  ever  attempt- 
ed to  analyse  and  explain  the  process  by  which 
their  industries  were  destroyed.  One  explana- 
tion only  has  been  given — that  the  Union  led  to 
absenteeism,  but  that  is  " worse  than  childish.' ' 
A  few  hundreds  or  thousands  may  have  spent 
more,  or  all  of  their  time  in  England,  but  what 
of  the  millions  that  remained?  They,  too,  wore 
boots,  and  shirts,  and  used  tools.  English, 
Scottish,  French,  and  Belgian  manufacturers 
throve  by  supplying  the  Irish  people  with 
goods,  the  Irish  manufacturers  alone  could  not. 
Why?    The  question  remains  unanswered. 

But  Connolly  is  not  content  to  disprove  these 
ordinarily  accepted  doctrines,  he  propounds  a 
positive  theory  of  his  own  which  is  in  utter  con- 
tradiction to  them.  It  was  not,  he  maintains, 
the  Union  which  produced  the  weakness  of  Irish 
manufacturers,  but  the  weakness  of  Irish  manu- 
facturers which  made  the  Union  possible.  Had 
there  been  in  Ireland  a  wealthy  and  energetic 
capitalist  class,  it  would  have  been  a  barrier 
against  corruption.  Again,  a  strong  and  enter- 
prising capitalist  class  would  not,  at  Grattan's 
bidding,  have  forsaken  and  denounced  the  Vol- 
unteers when  they  demanded  a  reformed  par- 
liamentary representation  and  a  more  popular 


CONSTITUTIONALISM  CONDEMNED     67 

suffrage.  And  an  Ireland  controlled  by  popular 
suffrage  would  undoubtedly  have  established  a 
stringent  system  of  protection  which,  applied  in 
time,  might  have  neutralised  the  advantage 
which  her  coalfields  gave  to  Great  Britain  in  the 
race  for  wealth. 

Taking  such  a  view  of  the  political  patriots 
of  the  eighteenth  century,  and  the  conscious  or 
subconscious  motives  of  the  movements  they 
directed  and  controlled,  it  is  not  surprising  that 
Connolly  conceived  a  profound  distrust  of  con- 
stitutional patriotism  and  of  the  parliamentary 
institutions  in  which  they  found  their  field  of 
operations.  To  him  there  was  no  difference 
between  a  Parliament  endowed  with  the  powers 
obtained  by  Grattan  and  the  Volunteers  and  a 
Parliament  shackled  and  made  impotent  by 
Poynings'  Law.  As  to  the  aviator,  hills  and 
valleys  are  flattened  into  one  level  plain,  so  to 
Connolly  Ireland's  history  from  1641  to  1800 
presents  no  alternations  of  outline,  it  is  a  dreary 
level  of  futility,  treachery,  and  corruption. 
Holding  that  belief,  he  regards  all  the  agitation 
of  the  nineteenth  century  with  contempt,  as  an 
effort,  always  fatuous  and  generally  dishonest, 
to  restore  a  system  which  was  useless  at  its 
best,  and  at  its  worst  was  absolutely  fatal  to 
Ireland's  cause.    Henceforth  he  devotes  but  lit- 


68  LABOUR  AND  THE  UNION 

tie  attention  to  constitutional  agitation,  except 
so  far  as  it  touches  the  revolutionary  move- 
ment, in  which  alone  he  sees  hope  of  the  regen- 
eration of  Ireland. 

In  his  last  speech  against  the  Union,  Henry 
Grattan,  seeing  defeat  to  be  inevitable,  apostro- 
phised Ireland  in  a  passage  which  has  often 
been  quoted: 

"Yet  I  do  not  give  up  the  country;  I  see  her 
in  a  swoon,  but  she  is  not  dead: 

Thou  art  not  conquered;   beauty's  ensign  yet 

Is  crimson  in  thy  lips  and  in  thy  cheeks, 

And  Death's  pale  flag  is  not  advanced  there." 

So,  too,  might  have  spoken  Connolly.  For  he 
sees  the  promise  of  returning  life  in  the  national 
revolutionary  movement  which  came  into  being 
while  Grattan 's  Parliament  was  at  its  zenith. 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE   REVOLUTIONARY   MOVEMENT 

For  parliamentary  Nationalism  the  eighteenth 
century  contains  four  facts  of  capital  impor- 
tance :  the  Union,  Grattan's  Parliament,  the  Pe- 
nal Laws,  the  rising  of  '98.  The  first  gives  it  its 
raison  d'etre,  the  second  its  ideal,  the  two  latter 
provide  it  with  material  to  rouse  the  passions 
and  stimulate  the  ardour  of  its  supporters.  For 
Connolly  the  century  contains  only  one  phenom- 
enon of  moment — the  establishment  of  the  So- 
ciety of  United  Irishmen  in  1791.  In  that  event 
he  sees  the  dawn  of  a  new  day  in  Ireland's  life, 
the  opening  of  an  era  of  new  visions  nobler  than 
the  old,  in  that  they  were  social  rather  than  po- 
litical. It  is  not  the  least  of  his  charges  against 
Parliamentarianism  that,  while  it  has  made  of 
the  rising  of  1798  an  epic  of  patriotism,  it  has 
deliberately  obscured  and  betrayed  the  princi- 
ples of  which  that  insurrection  was  the  expres- 
sion. 

69 


70    THE  REVOLUTIONARY  MOVEMENT 


a 


Few  movements  in  history  have  been  more 
consistently  misrepresented  by  open  enemies 
and  professed  admirers  than  that  of  the  United 
Irishmen.  .  .  .  The  middle-class  'patriotic'  his- 
torians, orators,  and  journalists  of  Ireland  have 
ever  vied  with  one  another  in  enthusiastic  de- 
scriptions of  their  military  exploits  on  land  and 
sea,  their  hair-breadth  escapes  and  heroic  mar- 
tyrdom, but  have  resolutely  suppressed  or  dis- 
torted their  writings,  songs,  and  manifestoes." 
It  may  be  that  Connolly,  bringing  to  the  study 
of  the  United  Irishmen  movement  a  mind  filled 
with  Socialistic  teaching,  read  into  it  a  more 
reasoned  and  genuine  expression  of  the  doc- 
trine of  social  revolt  than  it  contained.  It  was 
probably  more  of  a  political  movement  than  he 
admits,  but  it  was  certainly  more  of  a  social 
movement  than  subsequent  generations  have 
recognised.  It  is,  indeed,  only  by  recognising 
that  fact  that  an  explanation  can  be  found  for 
the  appearance  of  such  an  organisation  at  a  mo- 
ment when  Ireland  had  her  own  Parliament, 
equipped  with  very  ample  powers,  and  when  she 
was  on  the  flood-tide  of  a  prosperity  to  which 
she  was  unaccustomed.  The  influence  of  the  so- 
cial side  of  the  movement  has  made  itself  felt 
in  subsequent  revolutionary  movements,  such  as 
those   in   which   Thomas    Emmett    and    John 


THE  UNITED  IRISHMEN  71 

Mitchell  were  the  leading  figures.  And  there 
can  be  no  question  of  the  influence  of  the  United 
Irishmen  on  Connolly  himself,  and  even,  per- 
haps, upon  Sinn  Fein. 

Indeed,  there  is  so  curious  a  parallelism  be- 
tween the  objects  of  the  United  Irishmen  on 
one  side,  and  Sinn  Fein  and  James  Connolly  on 
the  other,  that,  were  generalised  inference  not 
so  notoriously  dangerous,  one  would  be  tempted 
to  say  that  at  this  point  Sinn  Fein  and  the 
Workers'  Republic  touched  hands  for  a  mo- 
ment, to  meet  again  in  co-operation  after  more 
than  a  century.  To  read  Connolly's  analysis 
of  the  history  of  the  United  Irishmen  is  almost 
to  read  the  story  of  Sinn  Fein : 
^  "The  organisation  was  at  first  an  open, 
\  peaceful  association,  seeking  to  utilise  the  ordi- 
\  nary  means  of  political  agitation  in  order  to 
spread  its  propaganda  among  the  masses,  and 
so  prepare  them  for  the  accomplishment  of  its 
greater  end — viz.,  the  realisation  in  Ireland  of 
a  republic.  .  .  .  Afterwards  .  .  .  the  organisa- 
tion assumed  the  veil  and  methods  of  secrecy, 
and  in  that  form  attained  to  such  proportions  as 
enabled  it  to  enter  into  negotiations  with  the 
Revolutionary  Directory  of  France." 
For  the  last  four  words  write  "  Germany/ ' 


72    THE  KEVOLUTIONABY  MOVEMENT 

and  the  parallelism  is  complete,  even  to  the  de- 
tail that  neither  of  the  foreign  allies  selected 
was  respectable. 

Eead  the  century-old  Minutes  of  the  first 
Dublin  Society  of  United  Irishmen — they  might 
have  been  penned  by  Arthur  Griffith: 

"We  have  no  National  Government;  we  are 
ruled  by  Englishmen  and  the  servants  of  Eng- 
lishmen, whose  object  is  the  interest  of  another 
country ;  whose  instrument  is  corruption ;  whose 
strength  is  the  weakness  of  Ireland.  .  .  ." 

In  the  Secret  Manifesto  to  the  Friends  of 
Freedom  in  Ireland  it  is  stated  that  the  external 
business  of  the  society  will  be  first  propaganda, 
second  communication  with  provincial  centres 
and  the  formation  of  a  National  Convention  of 
the  people  of  Ireland.  Sinn  Fein  calls  it  Dail 
Eireann. 

If  we  turn  to  the  social  side  of  the  pro- 
gramme, we  find  the  germs  of  the  proletarian 
revolutionary  movement.  It  teems  with  refer- 
ences to  the  Eights  of  Man  and  the  grandeur  of 
the  mission  of  the  French  revolutionaries.  ' '  Our 
freedom  must  be  had  at  all  hazards,"  so  writes 
"Wolfe  Tone.  "If  the  men  of  property  will  not 
help  us  they  must  fall ;  we  will  free  ourselves  by 
the  aid  of  that  large  and  respectable  class  of  the 
community — the  men  of  no  property." 


THE  EIGHTS  OF  MAN  73 

From  the  Minutes  of  the  first  Dublin  Society, 
already  quoted,  another  extract  may  be  made : 

"When  the  aristocracy  come  forward,  the 
people  fall  backward ;  when  the  people  come  for- 
ward, the  aristocracy,  fearful  of  being  left  be- 
hind, insinuate  themselves  into  our  ranks  and 
rise  into  timid  leaders  or  treacherous  auxilia- 
ries. They  mean  to  make  us  their  instruments, 
let  us  make  them  our  instruments.  .  .  .  The  peo- 
ple must  serve  the  party,  or  the  party  must 
emerge  in  the  mightiness  of  the  people,  and 
Hercules  will  then  lean  upon  his  club.  On  the 
14th  of  July,  the  day  which  shall  ever  commemo- 
rate the  French  Revolution,  let  this  Society  pour 
out  their  first  libation  to  European  liberty,  even- 
tually the  liberty  of  the  world  and  ...  let  them 
swear  to  maintain  the  rights  and  prerogatives 
of  their  nature  as  men,  and  the  rights  and  pre- 
rogative of  Ireland  as  an  independent  people.' ' 

In  these  and  similar  passages,  crude  as  is 
their  doctrine  and  turgid  their  phraseology,  can 
be  discerned  the  germ  of  new  ideas  of  democra- 
cy, of  internationalism  and  of  class  warfare.  Of 
the  second,  indeed,  the  traces  of  a  very  shadowy 
character,  and  too  much  must  not  be  deducted 
from  the  references  to  France.  The  Revolution 
was  then  in  the  minds  of  all,  the  "Rights  of 
Man"  tripped  from  every  tongue.    The  Irish, 


74    THE  EEVOLUTIONAEY  MOVEMENT 

ever  quick  to  take  impression  from  outside, 
would  take  them  most  readily  from  a  country 
the  traditional  enemy  of  England,  and  the  asy- 
lum for  thousands  of  Irish  refugees.  But  the 
ideas  of  class  interest,  of  what  would  now  be 
called  perhaps  class  consciousness,  were  assum- 
ing reality. 

Before  the  break-up  of  the  Confederation  of 
Kilkenny  and  the  disappearance  of  the  Clans 
from  Irish  history  the  main  lines  of  cleavage 
had  been  racial  and  religious,  and  so  they  con- 
tinued for  half  a  century.  But  the  Penal  Laws, 
which  did  maintain  the  religious  cleavage,  also 
produced  another  cleavage  which  cut  across  it. 
They  did  so  in  two  ways.  First,  though  it  is 
frequently  forgotten,  there  were  Penal  Laws 
against  Presbyterians  which  in  some  respects 
were  more  efficiently  applied  than  those  against 
the  Catholics.  Next,  the  anti-Catholic  Laws, 
though  they  were  so  outrageous  that  they  re- 
mained to  a  considerable  extent  a  dead  letter, 
did  have  the  effect  of  placing  the  industrial  and 
commercial  business  of  the  country  in  the  hands 
of  the  Protestants.  The  employers  of  labour 
were  not  considerate — there  is  abundant  evi- 
dence in  the  reports  of  Parliamentary  Commis- 
sions, taken  early  in  the  nineteenth  century,  to 
show  that  artisans  were  receiving  not  even  star- 
vation wages,  but  wages  which  had  to  be  supple- 


REGROUPING  PARTIES  75 

mented  by  the  mendicancy  of  the  family  to  keep 
them  from  starvation.  Probably,  on  the  whole, 
the  Protestant  workers  were  the  worst  off,  for 
they  formed  the  bulk  of  the  industrial  popula- 
tion. In  the  rural  districts  the  Catholic  tenant- 
ry found,  as  Connolly  puts  it,  that  "the  Catholic 
landlord  represented  the  Mass  less  than  the 
rent-roll/ '  and  in  the  preceding  chapter  we 
have  seen  them  protesting  as  much  against  the 
exactions  of  the  Catholic  priest  as  of  the  Pro- 
testant parson.  Thus  were  formed  other  lines 
of  cleavage — between  rich  and  poor,  employers 
and  employed,  landlord  and  tenant — which  cut 
across  the  religious  difference  and  forged  a  new 
bond  of  fellowship  between  the  members  of  the 
conflicting  creeds.  Hence  it  came  about  that 
Wolfe  Tone,  who,  if  he  were  anything,  was  a 
Protestant,  was  for  a  time  secretary  of  the 
Catholic  Committee  and  became  the  founder  of 
the  United  Irishmen,  many  of  whose  leaders 
were  Protestants,  and  which  numbered  many  of 
their  co-religionists  among  the  rank  and  file,  the 
bulk  of  which  represented  the  older  faith.  And 
it  is  not  without  significance  that  the  Society  of 
United  Irishmen  was  founded  in  Belfast. 

While,  then,  it  is  doubtful  how  far  the  ab- 
stractions represented  by  the  French  Revolu- 
tion had  permeated  the  mass  of  the  United 


76    THE  EEVOLUTIONAEY  MOVEMENT 

Irishmen,  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  in  their 
movement  can  be  found  the  first  organisation 
on  anything  like  a  national  scale  of  the  Irish 
proletariat.  The  operations  of  the  Oak  Boys 
and  Hearts  of  Steel  in  Monaghan  Down,  and 
Antrim,  and  of  the  more  formidable  White  Boys 
in  the  south,  were  the  premonitory  symptoms  of 
the  discontent  which  the  United  Irishmen  util- 
ised in  furtherance  of  their  political  purpose 
with  some  suggestion  that  the  wrongs  should  be 
righted.  The  accusation  which  Connolly  makes 
against  the  parliamentary  patriots  is  this — that 
while  they  utilised  the  discontent,  they  made  no 
effort  to  remove  or  mitigate  its  causes ;  nay,  that 
in  some  cases  they  resolutely  refused  to  do  so. 

However  far  the  movement  of  the  United 
Irishmen  may  have  been  permeated  by  demo- 
cratic and  proletarian  influence,  there  is  no 
doubt  that  the  Emmett  Conspiracy  owed  to  them 
such  success  as  it  had,  and  was  in  its  nature 
much  more  closely  allied  with  modern  Social- 
ism. Labour  had  been  building  up  an  organisa- 
tion until  there  were  in  Dublin  in  the  opening 
years  of  the  nineteenth  century  a  number  of  so- 
cieties, friendly  societies  in  name,  but  subserv- 
ing the  purpose  of  trade  unions.  Being  illegal, 
these  organisations  were  compelled  to  secrecy, 
and  so  became  admirable  engines  of  revolution- 


THE  EMMETT  CONSPIEACY        77 

ary  propaganda  and  organisation.  It  happened 
also  that  the  leaders  of  the  United  Irishmen, 
who  were  mainly  of  the  middle  class,  had  disap- 
peared, and  that  consequently  the  direction  of 
the  conspiracy  fell  more  into  the  hands  of  a  low- 
er order.  Emmett  himself  was  a  social  reformer 
of  an  advanced  type.  In  the  proclamation  which 
he  prepared  to  be  issued  in  the  name  of  the 
Provisional  Government  of  Ireland,  the  first 
three  articles  provided  for  the  wholesale  confis- 
cation and  nationalisation  of  all  Church  proper- 
ty, and  the  transfer  of  all  landed  property, 
bonds,  debentures  and  public  securities  until  the 
National  Government  should  be  established  and 
a  national  decision  taken  as  to  their  disposition. 
In  his  account  of  the  Emmett  Conspiracy 
Connolly  mentions  an  incident  of  no  historical 
moment,  but  interesting  as  revealing  his  attitude 
towards  those  whom  he  contemptuously  calls 
"patriots."  Daniel  O'Connell  was  turned  out 
in  the  Lawyers'  Yeomanry  Corps  of  Dublin  on 
the  night  of  the  rising,  and  later  pointed  out  to 
Mr.  Daunt  a  house  in  James  Street  which  he  had 
searched  for  "  Croppies.' '  (Croppies  was  a  nick- 
name for  the  rebels.)  And  Connolly  then  goes 
on  to  mention  that  he  himself  was  shown  at 
Derrynane,  the  home  of  the  0  'Connells  in  Ker- 
ry, a  blunderbuss  which  he  was  told  had  been 


78    THE  EEVOLUTIONAEY  MOVEMENT 

obtained  by  the  future  Liberator  from  the  own- 
er of  a  bouse  in  James  Street. 

A  quarter  of  a  century  later  O'Connell  comes 
again  upon  tbe  scene,  wbence  be  was  to  play  tbe 
leading  part,  and  to  win  undying  adulation  from 
Constitutional  Nationalism  and  unmitigated 
bostility  from  tbe  parties  of  Separation  and 
Eevolution. 

Tbose  twenty-five  years,  wbicb  tbe  lawyer 
spent  in  preparation  for  bis  great  political  ef- 
fort, were  bad  years  for  Labour.  Industrial 
prosperity  was  on  the  wane.  With  the  close  of 
the  Napoleonic  wars  came  a  fall  in  food  prices, 
and  tenants  found  it  increasingly  hard  to  pay 
their  rents.  Trouble  developed  between  land- 
lord and  tenant  in  the  country,  between  employ- 
er and  employed  in  the  towns.  The  trade  unions 
seem  to  have  acquired  strength  and  organisa- 
tion. They  were  still  illegal  up  to  1824,  but 
their  existence  was  being  recognised  and  winked 
at  by  the  employers,  who  often  found  it  conven- 
ient to  negotiate  with  them.  With  the  repeal 
of  the  anti-combinations  laws,  partial  as  it  was, 
in  1824  labour  organisation  developed  to  such 
an  extent  that  employers  became  seriously  con- 
cerned. 

The  chief  trouble  seems  to  have  arisen 
through  the  unions  being  rather  close  corpora- 


O'CONNELL  AND  LABOR  79 

tions,  restricted  in  their  membership,  and  re- 
senting the  employment  of  non-union  men,  or 
"colts."  *  Their  dealings  with  the  colts  were 
largely  executed  through  the  medium  of  persons 
bearing  the  suggestive  title  of  "welters,"  who 
conducted  their  physical  negotiations  with  much 
zeal  and  efficiency.  Parliamentary  Committees 
sat  from  time  to  time  to  examine  into  com- 
plaints of  violence  or  of  restraint  on  trade  on 
the  part  of  the  unions.  Violence  no  doubt  there 
was  in  plenty,  but  it  was  most  rife  in  the  earlier 
years  of  the  movement;  the  less  frequent  calls 
on  the  services  of  the  "welters"  were  coincident 
with,  and  symptomatic  of  the  growing  influence 
and  authority  of  organisation.  The  most  elabo- 
rate and  noteworthy  of  these  inquiries  was  that 
instituted  on  the  motion  of  O'Connell  to  investi- 
gate the  "constitution,  proceedings  and  extent 
of  combination  by  workers." 

O'Connell 's  action  was  dictated  by  unveiled 
hostility  to  the  Labour  movement.  "He  stood 
in  sober  fact,"  says  Mr.  W.  P.  Ryan,f  "for 
industrial  despotism  and  spoliation."  In  the 
opening  stages  of  his  agitation  for  the  Repeal  of 

*  In  their  History  of  Trade  Unionism  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Sid- 
ney Webb  describe  the  rules  of  the  Dublin  Trades  Unions  as 
"abominably  selfish,"  a  view  with  which  Mr.  W.  P.  Kyan,  in 
The  Irish  Labour  Movement,  does  not  agree. 

f  The  Irish  Labour  Movement,  p.  89. 


80    THE  REVOLUTIONARY  MOVEMENT 

the  Union  he  had  had  the  backing  of  the  work- 
ing classes,  partly,  says  Connolly,  because  they 
accepted  his  doctrine  that  the  decay  of  Irish 
trade  was  due  to  the  Union,  and  partly  because 
1 '  they  did  not  believe  he  was  sincere  in  his  pro- 
fessions of  loyalty  to  the  English  Monarchy, 
nor  in  his  desire  to  limit  his  aims  to  Repeal.' '  * 
In  return  for  their  support  he  incorporated  the 
trades  organisations  in  his  Association,  giving 
them  the  same  rights  as  the  regularly  enrolled 
members.  To  this  many  of  his  supporters  ob- 
jected. The  Irish  Monthly  Magazine,  an  enthu- 
siastic Repeal  organ,  was  especially  vigorous  in 
its  denunciation  of  the  industrial  alliance,  and 
wrote  that  it  "apprehended  great  mischief  and 
little  good  from  the  trade  unions  as  at  present 
constituted."  It  is  possible  that  such  protests 
from  O'Connell's  followers  emboldened  the 
Lord  Lieutenant  to  proclaim  a  huge  trade  union 
demonstration  in  favour  of  Repeal.  An  alli- 
ance of  this  kind,  when  the  enthusiasm  of  one 
party  was  largely  founded  on  the  belief  that  the 
leader  of  the  movement  was  a  hypocrite,  and 
when  there  was  no  reciprocal  sympathy  on  the 
other,  could  not,  and  did  not,  last  very  long.  As 
O'Connell  gravitated  more  and  more  towards 
the  Whig  Party,  then  notoriously  unfriendly  to 

*  Labour  m  Irish  History,  p.  150. 


A  EEJECTED  ALLIANCE  81 

the  demands  and  aspirations  of  Labour — he  was 
a  vigorous  opponent  of  Lord  Ashley's  efforts  to 
amend  the  Factory  Laws — ' i  he  gradually  devel- 
oped into  the  most  bitter  and  unscrupulous  ene- 
my of  trade  unionism  Ireland  has  yet  produced, 
signalling  the  trade  unions  of  Dublin  out  always 
for  his  most  venomous  attack."*  At  last  in 
1837  he  was  Chairman  of  the  Masters'  Anti- 
Combination  Society,  and  was  denounced  by  his 
former  working-class  supporters,  who  hooted 
him  in  the  street  and  broke  up  his  meetings. 

In  such  a  spirit  he  moved  for  the  inquiry  of 
1838,  and  himself  took  part  in  it.  As  an  attack 
on  Labour  it  was  not  a  success.  Acts  of  violence 
were  proved,  but  so  also  was  the  very  deplorable 
condition  of  the  workers.  The  Committee,  per- 
haps for  this  very  reason,  presented  no  Eeport. 
To  emphasise  the  completeness  of  O'Connell's 
hostility  to  Labour  Connolly  describes  his  dif- 
ferences with  Feargus  O'Connor,  one  of  his 
ablest  supporters  and  later  famous  as  a  leader 
of  the  Chartists.  O'Connor  held  the  view  that 
Irish  oppression  was  mainly  economic  and,  see- 
ing the  miserable  condition  of  the  English  work- 
er, he  strove  to  induce  his  leader  to  share  his 
views  and  to  unite  the  British  and  Irish  democ- 
racies in  a  common  movement.    O'Connell  re- 

*  Connolly,  Labour  m  Irish  History,  p.  150. 


82  THE  EEVOLUTIONAKY  MOVEMENT 

fused  the  advice,  although  it  promised  him  a 
large  addition  of  strength,  and  the  friends  sep- 
arated. Indeed,  during  the  famous  State  trials, 
Eichard  Lalor  Shiel  made  it  one  of  his  pleas  in 
favour  of  0  'Connell  that  he  had  stood  between 
the  people  of  Ireland  and  the  people  of  Eng- 
land, and  so  "prevented  a  junction  which  would 
be  formidable  enough  to  overturn  any  adminis- 
tration that  could  be  formed.' ' 

This  policy  of  O'Connell  and  its  motives  will 
be  variously  estimated.  To  some  it  will  appear 
admirable  that  he  was  ready  to  risk  his  position 
and  impair  his  hope  of  securing  Repeal  of  the 
Union  rather  than  be  the  means  of  initiating  a 
social  revolution,  with  all  its  attendant  horrors. 
To  Connolly,  and  the  men  of  the  modern  Irish 
Labour  movement,  he  appears  as  a  traitor  to 
democracy  and  the  champion  of  industrial  des- 
potism. To  Sinn  Fein  he  is  a  traitor  to  the  old 
Gaelic  language  and  the  old  Gaelic  culture, 
and  a  helot  in  that  he  recognised  British  rule, 
even  though  he  tried  to  abolish  it. 

Thus  is  this  distinguished  man,  the  "Lib- 
erator," whose  name  was  one  to  conjure  with  in 
Irish  Nationalism,  cast  from  his  pedestal  by  the 
Irish  patriots  of  to-day.  To  one  section  he  is  a 
helot,  to  the  other  a  slave-driver,  to  all  the  ene- 
my of  Irish  freedom.    The  whole  Repeal  move- 


IRELAND  BETRAYED  83 

ment,  indeed,  is  held  by  them  to  have  been  a 
betrayal  of  the  cause  of  Ireland.  O'Connell  rec- 
ommended it  as  a  link  with  England,  he  was 
ready  to  help  England  in  "bringing  down  the 
American  Eagle  in  its  highest  pride  of  flight." 
In  saying  it  he  was  a  traitor.  Lord  Lyndhurst, 
in  a  speech,  had  described  the  Irish  as  "alien  in 
blood,  in  language,  and  in  religion."  Richard 
Lalor  Shiel  replied  to  him  in  a  speech  of  im- 
passioned eloquence.  In  one  passage,  often 
quoted,  he  repelled  the  insult  by  extolling  the 
valour  of  Irish  soldiers  in  England's  army. 
Shiel  held  Lord  Lyndhurst 's  words  to  be  an 
insult;  Sinn  Fein  and  Connolly  "triumphantly 
assert  the  idea  embodied  in  that  phrase  as  the 
real  basis  of  Irish  Nationalism." 


CHAPTEE  VII 

THE   NINETEENTH    CENTtTEY 

To  find  the  real  thread  of  the  revolutionary 
movement  during  this  period  we  must  turn  from 
the  town  to  the  country.  In  the  towns  organi- 
sation was  only  feeling  its  way,  and  as  it  ad- 
vanced so  did  violence  apparently  diminish.  In 
the  country,  on  the  contrary,  the  organisation 
was  singularly  effective,  and  as  it  became  more 
perfect  so  did  the  ferocity  of  its  methods  in- 
crease. 

The  years  that  followed  the  close  of  the  Na- 
poleonic wars  were  times  of  distress  in  Ireland 
as  in  Great  Britain.  As  prices  of  foodstuffs  fell, 
tenants  could  not  pay  the  high  rents  fixed  dur- 
ing the  long  years  of  war;  as  wheat-growing  be- 
came unprofitable,  farms  were  amalgamated  in- 
to grazing  estates,  and  in  both  cases  evictions 
followed.  And,  strangely  enough,  the  grant  of 
Catholic  Emancipation  contributed  to  the  trou- 
ble. That  Act,  which  forms  O'Connell's  chief 
claim  to  the  gratitude  of  Ireland,  was  accompa- 

84 


AGEAEIAN  POVEETY  85 

nied  by  a  narrowing  of  the  franchise.  Before  the 
passing  of  the  Act  all  tenants  paying  an  annnal 
rental  of  forty  shillings  had  had  a  vote ;  by  the 
Act  the  qualification  was  fixed  at  £10.  As  a  re- 
sult evictions  increased.  Landlords  had  previ- 
ously welcomed  a  large  tenantry,  which  under 
the  system  of  open  voting  increased  their  politi- 
cal power.  This  inducement  being  removed,  they 
were  the  more  ready  to  obey  the  dictates  of  the 
economic  difficulties  above  mentioned,  and  to 
reduce  the  number  of  their  tenants.  ' '  The  Cath- 
olic middle,  professional,  and  landed  classes,' ' 
says  Connolly,  "by  Catholic  Emancipation  had 
the  way  opened  to  them  for  all  the  snug  berths 
in  the  disposal  of  the  Government ;  the  Catholics 
of  the  poorer  class  as  a  result  of  the  same  Act 
were  doomed  to  extermination  to  satisfy  the 
vengeance  of  a  foreign  Government  and  an 
aristocracy  whose  power  had  been  defied  when 
it  knew  itself  most  supreme.' ' 

The  result  was  the  famous  Eibbon  Move- 
ment, so  called  from  the  fact  that  the  members 
of  the  society,  when  on  duty,  wore  a  ribbon 
round  their  arms.  This  society  had  been  in  ex- 
istence some  eight  or  nine  years  at  the  time  of 
the  Emancipation  Act,  and  lasted,  with  quies- 
cent intervals,  until  about  1857.  Its  period  of 
greatest  activity,  however,  was  during  the  thir- 


86       THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY 

ties.  Its  organisation  was  remarkably  good, 
and  the  secrecy  in  which  it  enshrouded  its  pro- 
ceedings for  long  remained  practically  impene- 
trable. Many  parliamentary  inquiries  were  held 
into  the  nature  and  proceedings  of  the  Ribbon 
Society;  it  was  denounced  by  the  Catholic  hier- 
archy, but  it  continued  on  its  way,  unmoved  and 
unrevealed.  By  many,  among  them  Sir  George 
Cornewall  Lewis,  it  was  described  as  a  trade 
union,  and  Connolly  expresses  the  opinion  that 
it  was  an  industrial  trade  union  for  the  protec- 
tion of  labourers  and  cottier  farmers.  That 
it  was  a  combination  for  these  purposes  is  cer- 
tain, and  it  also  intervened  to  prevent  the  low- 
ering of  wages  and  to  promote  the  lowering  of 
Church  dues.  But  to  class  it  as  a  trade  union 
is  an  injustice  to  those  bodies,  as  well  as  his- 
torically inaccurate. 

In  support  of  this  it  will  be  interesting  to 
consider  the  obligation  which  candidates  for  in- 
itiation were  compelled  to  undertake.  For  many 
years  the  terms  of  the  Ribbonmen's  oath  were 
in  doubt.  Forms  of  obligation  were  produced, 
purporting  to  be  the  real  oath,  but  the  matter 
was  not  finally  settled  until  the  Parnell  Com- 
mission. During  that  inquiry  an  oath  was  read 
to  a  witness,  who  replied  that  he  had  never 
heard  it,  though  he  would  not  swear  that  he 


THE  RIBBON  OATH  87 

had  not  heard  something  like  it.  While  the 
question  was  being  discussed,  Mr.  Michael 
Davitt,  an  authority  on  such  matters,  rose  and 
informed  the  Commission  that  the  words  were 
those  of  the  Ribbon  Oath.    It  runs  as  follows : 

"In  the  presence  of  Almighty  God,  and  this 
my  brother,  I  do  swear  that  I  will  suffer  my 
right  hand  to  be  cut  from  my  body  and  laid  at 
the  gaol  door  before  I  will  waylay  or  betray  a 
brother,  and  I  will  persevere  and  not  spare  from 
the  cradle  to  the  crutch  and  the  crutch  to  the 
cradle ;  that  I  will  not  hear  the  moans  or  groans 
of  infancy  or  old  age,  but  that  I  will  wade  knee- 
deep  in  Orangemen's  blood  and  do  as  King 
James  did. ' '  * 

The  words  of  this  atrocious  obligation  dem- 
onstrate quite  distinctly  that,  while  the  immedi- 
ate objects  of  Ribbonism  were  allied  to  those  of 
trade  unions,  it  had  religious  and  political  im- 
plications which  differentiated  it  from  these 
bodies.  Political  genealogists,  indeed,  trace  the 
lineage  of  Ribbonism  back  through  the  Defend- 
ers to  Rory  Oge  0  'Moore.  In  Ribbonism,  there- 
fore, and  its  satellites,  the  Whitefeet,  the  Black- 
feet,  the  Terry  Alts,  the  Lady  Clares,  we  have 
revolutionary  bodies,  political  as  well  as  eco- 
nomic.   If  personal  opinion  may  here  be  inter- 

*  Official  Report  of  the  Parnell  Commission,  Vol.  III.,  p.  153. 


88       THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY 

polated  it  may  be  surmised  that,  while  contem- 
porary writers  describes  Ribbonism  as  a  trade 
union  movement  in  order  to  discredit  trade 
unions,  Connolly  follows  the  same  line  in  order 
to  glorify  both  and  point  trade  unions  in  the 
way  they  should  go. 

He  makes  it  a  ground  of  complaint  against 
O'Connell's  supporters  that  they  denounced 
this  Ribbon  Movement.  He  quotes  with  disgust 
a  manifesto  posted  in  the  market  place  of  Ennis 
and  in  other  parts  of  Clare  by  Mr.  Thomas 
Steele,  a  very  ardent  Repealer,  in  which  he  said, 
"  Unless  you  desist  I  denounce  you  as  traitors 
to  the  cause  of  the  liberty  of  Ireland.  ...  I 
leave  you  to  the  Government  and  the  fire  and 
bayonets  of  the  military." 

Connolly  reprobates  such  language  to  the 
heroic  men  and  women  who  had  sacrificed  all 
' '  to  win  the  emancipation  from  religious  tyran- 
ny of  the  well-fed  snobs  who  thus  abandoned 
them. ' '    And  he  continues : 

"  It  is  difficult  to  see  how  a  promised  Repeal 
of  the  Union  some  time  in  the  future  could  have 
been  of  any  use  to  the  starving  men  of  Clare, 
especially  when  they  knew  that  their  fathers 
had  been  starved,  evicted,  and  tyrannised  even 
before  just  as  they  were  after  the  Union.  At 
that  time,  however,  it  was  deemed  a  highly  pa- 


FAMINE  89 

triotio  act  to  ascribe  all  the  ills  that  Irish  flesh 

is  heir  to  to  the  Union." 

*  *  #  # 

Then  came  the  Famine.  It  is  not  a  story  one 
cares  to  linger  over,  that  story  of  suffering  and 
blundering  pedantry.  But  it  has  to  be  noted  be- 
cause of  the  lasting  hostility  to  England  which 
it  engendered  in  the  Irish  race,  and  because  of 
the  deductions  drawn  from  it  by  Connolly.  He 
accepts  the  saying  of  the  Irish  Nationalists  that 
"Providence  sent  the  potato  blight,  but  Eng- 
land made  the  famine,' '  with  this  addendum, 
"by  a  rigid  application  of  the  economic  princi- 
ples that  lie  at  the  base  of  capitalist  Society. ' '  To 
venture  for  a  moment  into  controversy,  it  may 
be  suggested  that  he  would  be  nearer  the  truth 
if  for  the  last  words  he  had  written  "that  lay 
at  the  base  of  the  Whig  policy."  There  have 
been  famines  since,  in  India  and  elsewhere, 
which  have  been  met,  even  under  "capitalist 
Society,"  with  methods  very  different  from 
those  that  were  employed  in  1846.  It  was  Ire- 
land's greatest  misfortune  to  be  stricken  with 
hunger  and  disease  while  the  country  was  ruled 
by  a  party  which,  of  all  those  that  have  gov- 
erned during  a  century  and  a  half,  was  the  most 
prolific  of  axioms  and  the  most  sterile  of  soul. 

Connolly  uses  the  declaration  of  Lord  John 


90      THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY 

Russell,  then  Prime  Minister,  that  nothing  must 
be  done  to  interfere  with  private  enterprise  in 
the  regular  course  of  trade — a  policy  rigidly 
followed  even  to  the  incredible  stupidity  of 
stipulating  in  the  Relief  Acts  that  all  labour 
should  be  entirely  unproductive — to  argue  that 
such  a  policy  would  be  impossible  under  Social- 
ism, though  entirely  logical  under  Capitalism. 
"  Within  the  limits  of  that  social  system  and 
its  theories  their  Acts  are  unassailable  and  un- 
impeachable ;  it  is  only  when  we  reject  that  sys- 
tem and  the  intellectual  and  social  fetters  it 
imposes  that  we  really  acquire  the  right  to  de- 
nounce the  English  administration  of  Ireland 
during  the  famine  as  a  colossal  crime  against 
the  human  race.  The  non-Socialist  Irish  man  or 
woman  who  fumes  against  that  administration 
is  in  the  illogical  position  of  denouncing  an  ef- 
fect of  whose  cause  he  is  a  supporter.  That 
cause  was  the  system  of  capitalist  property. 
With  the  exception  of  those  few  men  we  have 
before  named,  the  Young  Ireland  leaders  of 
1848  failed  to  rise  to  the  grandeur  of  the  oppor- 
tunity offered  them  to  choose  between  human 
rights  and  property  rights  as  a  basis  of  nation- 
ality, and  the  measure  of  their  failure  was  the 
measure  of  their  country's  disaster.' ' 


EESPECTABLE  FAILURES  91 

The  Rebellion  of  1848  convulsed  Ireland — 
with  laughter.  Inept  in  conception,  it  was  piti- 
fully feeble  and  spiritless  in  execution.  Yet 
its  leaders  were  neither  fools  nor  cowards.  One 
of  them,  Gavan  Duffy,  became  a  Colonial  Pre- 
mier ;  among  them  were  men  of  ability  and  read- 
ing ;  they  had  courage — cowards  do  not  of  their 
own  will  go  the  way  of  the  scaffold ;  one  of  them, 
Meagher,  was  destined,  fifteen  years  later,  in 
the  American  Civil  War,  to  prove  himself  a 
fighting  man  and  a  leader  of  fighting  men. 
What  then  made  of  these  men,  mentally  alert, 
physically  brave,  fired  with  zeal  for  the  demo- 
cratic principles  of  Mazzini,  stirred  by  the  up- 
rising of  the  French  democracy,  blunderers,  con- 
temptible in  council  and  nerveless  in  action? 
Connolly  has  no  doubts  as  to  the  answer — re- 
spectability. Perhaps  he  is  right.  Men  who 
would  conduct  a  revolution  for  the  upsetting  of 
social  order — and  for  Connolly  no  other  revolu- 
tion counts — must  be  fanatical  in  their  creed  and 
unscrupulous  in  their  methods.  That  O'Brien 
and  Meagher  and  Doheny  and  Duffy  were  nei- 
ther fanatical  nor  unscrupulous  is  the  unforgiv- 
able crime  which  arouses  Connolly's  wrath  and 
sharpens  his  gibes.  "The  chiefs  of  the  Young 
Irelander,"  he  says,  "were  as  rabidly  solicitous 
about  the  rights  of  the  landlord  as  were  the 


92       THE  NINETEENTH  CENTUBY 

chiefs  of  the  English  Government.  While  the 
people  perished  the  Young  Irelanders  talked, 
and  their  talk  was  very  beautiful,  thoroughly 
grammatical,  nicely  polished,  and  the  proper 
amount  of  passion  introduced  at  the  proper  psy- 
chological moment. ' ' 

In  effect  he  charges  the  leaders  of  the  Young 
Irelanders  with  not  understanding,  or,  if  they 
understood,  being  false  to  the  principles  they 
professed.  They  were  bourgeois  mumbling 
democratic  formulas,  dreaming  of  rebellion  but 
repudiating  revolution,  and  unfit  to  use  the  ma- 
terial ready  to  their  hand.  Such  material  was 
there  in  the  Eibbon  Society,  unrivalled  for  the 
purpose  of  social  revolution,  unscrupulous,  mys- 
terious, pitiless,  "deaf  to  the  moans  of  infancy 
or  age."  It  may  be  that  it  was  those  very  quali- 
fications which  repelled  the  leaders  of  Young 
Ireland,  men  of  less  callous  fibre.  If  so,  in  Con- 
nolly's eyes,  it  was  a  grievous  fault,  bringing 
them  down  almost  to  the  level  of  the  constitu- 
tional ' i  patriots, ' '  and  grievously  does  he  mourn 
it.  The  whole  of  Connolly's  attitude  towards 
the  Young  Irelander  deserves  most  careful  at- 
tention for  the  light  it  casts  on  the  problem  set 
forth  in  the  first  chapter  of  this  book,  and  on  the 
present  Irish  situation.  Though  Smith  0  'Brien 
and  his  friends  were  willing  to  break  the  British 
connection  by  force  of  arms,  they  are  little  bet- 


FINTAN  LALOR  93 

ter  than  such  "helots"  as  O'Connell  because 
their  aims  were  limited  to  political  change,  and 
did  not  embrace  the  overthrow  of  the  whole  so- 
cial system  at  whatever  cost  of  life  or  suffering. 

And  the  tragedy  of  the  failure  is  all  the  more 
complete  because  these  faineant  leaders  sinned 
against  the  light.  There  were  men  among  them 
who  saw  the  truth  and  pointed  the  way.  John 
Mitchell  was  insistent  on  the  necessity  and  pol- 
icy of  a  social  revolution  which  would  have 
brought  the  English  Chartists  into  the  field. 
Fintan  Lalor,  a  cripple  debarred  from  physical 
service,  was  especially  bitter  against  the  policy 
of  Smith  0  'Brien  and  his  colleagues : 

"They  wanted  an  alliance  with  the  landown- 
ers. They  chose  to  consider  them  as  Irishmen, 
and  imagined  they  could  induce  them  to  hoist 
the  green  flag.  .  .  .  They  desired  not  a  demo- 
cratic, but  merely  a  national,  revolution. ' ' 

Both  these  men  were  of  the  stuff  from  which 
the  true  revolutionist  is  made.  But  while 
Mitchell  was  fitted  for  the  barricade,  Lalor  was 
pre-eminently  the  man  for  the  council  chamber, 
quick  to  grasp  the  broad  principles  and  subtle 
in  the  weaving  of  the  plans. 

First  of  all  rebels  against  British  rule,  they 
proclaimed  that  political  rebellion  and  economic 
revolution  should  march  together.     How  far 


94       THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY 

Lalor  preached  this  doctrine  as  an  article  of 
faith  or  as  a  practical  instrument  of  rebellion  is 
a  little  uncertain.  In  a  passage  in  which  he  as- 
serts that ' '  the  soil  of  the  country  belongs  as  of 
right  to  the  entire  people  of  that  country,  not  to 
any  class,  but  the  nation,' '  he  is  careful  to  add, 
"no  one  has  a  higher  respect  for  the  rights  of 
property  than  I  have,  but  I  do  not  class  among 
them  the  robber  rights  by  which  the  hands  of 
this  country  are  held  in  the  grasp  of  Irish  Na- 
tionalism." * 

And,  indeed,  he  throws  Socialism  to  the  winds 
in  his  letter  to  the  landowners  of  Ireland,  in 
which  he  invites  them,  not  to  become  Repealers, 
but  to  think  and  act  as  Irishmen,  and  condition- 
ally on  their  doing  so  offers  them  "new  titles" 
and  tells  them  that  Ireland  will  remain  theirs 
for  ages.  "Allegiance  to  this  fair  island;  it  is 
your  title  of  tenure  to  the  lands  you  hold,  and  in 
right  of  it  you  hold  them. ' '  There  is  no  trace  of 
land  nationalisation  in  this  passage,  nor  in  the 
very  eloquent  document  of  which  it  is  a  part.f 

It  is,  however,  unnecessary  to  speculate  as  to 
the  precise  shade  of  Lalor 's  economic  creed,  for 
above    all    things    he    insists    on    the    land 

*  Irish  Felon,  No.  1. 

f  Ecprinted  from  the  Nation  in  Sir  Charles  Duffy 's  Four 
Years  of  Irish  History. 


A  SPUR  TO  PATRIOTISM  95 

question  as  a  weapon  of  successful  rebellion. 

In  his  paper,  the  Irish  Felon — founded  when 
John  Mitchell's  United  Irishman  was  sup- 
pressed, and  itself  suppressed  after  three  issues 
— he  denounces  Repeal  as  impracticable  and  ab- 
surd: 

"I  mean  to  assert  this,  that  the  land  question 
contains,  and  the  legislative  question  does  not 
contain,  the  materials  from  which  victory  is 
manufactured.  .  .  .  This  island  is  ours,  and 
have  it  we  will. ' '  * 

Again : 

t  i  There  is,  I  am  convinced,  but  one  way  alone, 
and  that  is  link  Repeal  to  some  other  question, 
like  the  railway  carriage  to  the  engine,  some 
question  strong  enough  to  carry  both  itself  and 
Repeal  together.  And  such  a  question  there  is 
in  the  land — one  ready  prepared,  ages  have  been 
preparing  it.  An  engine  ready  made ;  one  too 
that  will  generate  its  own  steam  without  cost  or 
care — a  self-acting  engine  if  once  the  fire  be 
kindled.  Repeal  had  always  to  be  dragged. 
This  I  speak  of  will  carry  itself  as  the  cannon 
ball  carries  itself  down  the  hill. ' '  f 

In  The  Faith  of  a  Felon  he  further  devel- 
ops the  thesis: — 

"I  perceived  that  the  English  conquest  con- 

*  Irish  Felon,  No.  1.  t  Ibid.,  No.  2. 


96       THE  NINETEENTH  CENTUEY 

sisted  of  two  parts  combined  into  a  whole,  the 
conquest  of  our  liberties  and  the  conquest  of  our 
lands.  I  saw  clearly  the  reconquest  of  our  lib- 
erties would  be  incomplete  and  worthless  with- 
out the  reconquest  of  our  lands — and  could  not, 
on  its  own  means,  be  possibly  achieved;  while 
the  reconquest  of  our  lands  would  involve  the 
other,  and  could  possibly,  if  not  easily,  !be 
achieved.  The  lands  were  owned  by  the  con- 
quering race  or  by  the  traitors  of  the  conquered 
race.  They  were  occupied  by  the  native  people 
or  by  settlers  who  had  mingled  or  merged. ' '  * 
Thus  selecting  the  land  question  as  the  engine 
which  should  drag  Eepeal — and  it  will  be  noted 
that,  while  Lalor  speaks  of  Eepeal,  he  means 
complete  independence' — he  advised  that  the 
revolution  should  proceed,  not  by  offensive  and 
open  war,  but  by  defensive  measures,  to  be  con- 
verted into  open  warfare  should  occasion  offer. 
Tenants  should  refuse  on  principle  to  pay  any 
rents  at  all  until  a  National  Convention  should 
decide  what  rents  they  should  pay  and  to  whom 
they  should  pay  them.  Such  a  Convention 
1  i  ought  on  grounds  of  policy  and  economy  to 
decide  that  those  rents  should  be  paid  to  them- 
selves, the  people,  for  public  purposes  and  for 
the  behalf  and  benefit  of  them,  the  entire  gen- 

*  Irish  Felon,  No.  3,  July  8th,  1848. 


A  PLAN  OF  CAMPAIGN  97 

eral  people.' '  Meanwhile,  pending  such  a  Con- 
vention, the  people  should  immediately  refuse 
to  pay  all  rents  and  arrears,  except  any  surplus 
of  the  harvest  which  might  remain  after  making 
due  and  full  provision  for  their  own  needs  dur- 
ing the  ensuing  year.  And  then  he  formulates 
the  plan  of  campaign  in  the  event  of  the  British 
Government  employing  armed  force : 

"We  must  only  try  to  keep  our  harvest,  to 
offer  a  peaceful  passive  resistance,  to  barricade 
the  island,  to  break  up  the  roads,  to  break  down 
the  bridges,  and  should  need  be,  and  favourable 
occasion  occur,  surely  we  may  venture  to  try 
the  steel." 

The  Young  Irelanders  rejected  Lalor  's  coun- 
sels in  1848.  Had  they  accepted  them  their 
movement  would  not  have  been  the  pitiful  farce 
it  was.  But,  as  Connolly  points  out,  they  were 
barred  from  accepting  them  because  they  were 
bourgeois,  respectable,  and,  some  of  them,  own- 
ers of  property.  Even  had  they  followed  them, 
they  might  have  failed,  as  Lalor's  plan  failed 
when  put  into  operation  forty  years  later  by  Mi- 
chael Davitt.  Such  speculations  are  profitless ; 
the  thing  that  matters  is  that  it  was  Lalor  who 
pointed  Connolly  on  the  road  to  social  revolu- 
tion as  an  instrument  of  Separation.  The  seed 
sown  in  the  Irish  Felon  in  1848  only  came  to  its 


98      LTHE  NINETEENTH  CENTUEY 

full  maturity  after  the  lapse  of  more  than  half 
a  century. 

The  Fenian  Eising  in  the  middle  'sixties, 
though  as  a  rebellion  it  was  far  better  planned 
and  more  virile  than  that  of  Smith  0  'Brien,  was 
run  on  much  the  same  general  lines.  Connolly, 
indeed,  suggests  that  it  had  some  of  the  implica- 
tions of  social  revolution,  and  regards  the  se- 
lection for  the  post  of  Commander-in-Chief  of 
General  Cluseret,  who  afterwards  commanded 
the  army  of  the  Paris  Commune,  as  pointing  in 
that  direction.  This,  however,  seems  to  be 
another  case  of  his  reading  his  own  subjective 
thought  into  a  political  movement.  All  revolu- 
tionaries meet  on  a  plane  of  advanced  ideas, 
and  Cluseret  was  probably  one  of  those  adven- 
turous soldiers  who  turn  up  wherever  there  is 
trouble.  Mr.  Eyan,  the  historian  of  Irish  La- 
bour, apparently  disagrees  with  Connolly's 
view,  for  he  describes  Fenianism  as  for  several 
years  turning  several  of  the  sturdier  Irish  ele- 
ments from  immediate  social  issues.  There  was 
certainly  no  trace  of  Lalor's  influence  in  the 
Fenian  rebellion. 

It  is,  indeed,  interesting  and  instructive  to 
note  how  completely  the  economic  factor  was 
excluded  from  the  national  movement  in  the 
years  that  followed  1848.    While  that  abortive 


THE  DAWN  OF  SOCIALISM         99 

rising  was  being  contemplated  William  Thomp- 
son, an  Irish  landlord,  had  written  a  book  on  the 
distribution  of  wealth  in  which  he,  to  a  very 
great  extent,  anticipated  the  doctrines  of  Marx. 
The  teaching  of  Eobert  Owen,  the  Utopian  So- 
cialist, had  enlisted  the  sympathies  of  many 
Irishmen  of  ability  and  social  position.  A  So- 
cialist Colony,  on  his  model,  was  established  at 
Ealahine,  in  County  Clare,  and  is  said  to  have 
achieved  considerable  success,  until  it  came  to 
an  end  owing  to  the  estate  having  to  change 
hands.  0  'Connell's  Eepeal  agitation  hadf ailed ; 
Smith  O'Brien's  rebellion  had  failed  ignomini- 
ously — Fintan  Lalor  had  shown  the  cause  of 
those  failures.  And  yet  none  of  these  events 
might  have  occurred  for  all  the  mark  they  left 
on  the  parliamentary  demand  for  Irish  self-gov- 
ernment. 

Lalor 's  teaching  was,  indeed,  zealously  ig- 
nored by  the  Parliamentarians.  To  admit  that 
of  itself  the  demand  for  self-government  could 
not  move  the  people,  seemed  to  them  a  fatal  con- 
fession. When  Unionists  quoted  Lalor 's  words 
that  "Kepeal  had  to  be  dragged,' '  they  resented 
and  denied  the  charge.  Even  Parnell,  who  of  all 
the  Parliamentarians  is  most  leniently  treated 
by  the  extremists,  was  only  with  great  difficulty 
brought  to  agree  to  Davitt's  proposal  to  estab- 
lish the  Land  League  in  1879,  and  repudiated — 


100       THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY 

a  little  tardily,  but  still  repudiated — the  "Plan 
of  Campaign,' '  which  embodied  Lalor's  pro- 
posal to  pay  only  so  much  rent  as  tenants  could 
afford,  in  1887,  and  Parnell,  though  he  fought 
for  Home  Rule  in  the  legislative  arena,  was — if 
his  assurance  to  the  American  Irish  at  Cincin- 
nati were  honest — at  heart  an  advocate  of  com- 
plete separation. 

These  were  his  words: 

"When  we  have  given  Ireland  to  the  people 
of  Ireland,  we  shall  have  laid  the  foundation 
upon  which  to  build  up  our  Irish  nation.  .  .  . 
And  let  us  not  forget  that  that  is  the  ultimate 
goal  at  which  all  we  Irishmen  aim.  None  of  us, 
whether  we  be  in  America  or  Ireland — or  wher- 
ever we  may  be — will  be  satisfied  until  we  have 
destroyed  the  last  link  which  keeps  Ireland 
bound  to  England."* 

This,  then,  was  the  lesson  which  Connolly 
learned  from  his  survey  of  Irish  history.  He 
saw  the  miseries  of  the  proletariat  exploited  by 
"patriots" — the  inverted  commas  are  his — to 
further  their  movements,  but  in  the  movements 
themselves  he  saw  no  sign  of  a  desire  to  allevi- 
ate those  miseries — nay,  in  some  instances  he 
found  a  settled  hostility  to  the  attempts  of  La- 
bour to   obtain  alleviation   of  its*  sufferings. 

*  Speech  at  Cincinnati,  February  23rd,  1880. 


WHAT  CONNOLLY  LEARNED      101 

Even  in  the  revolutionary  movements,  though 
there  he  could  discern  some  rays  of  light,  he 
does  not  touch  solid  ground.  And  nowhere  does 
he  detect  recognition  of  what  is  to  him  essential 
— that  the  social  reconstruction  of  the  Ireland 
of  to-day  must  be  framed  in  the  mould  of  the 
old  Gaelic  system  of  communal  property,  or  if 
not  in  the  same  mould — for  allowance  must  be 
made  for  modern  conditions — at  least  in  the 
spirit  which  inspired  that  system. 

And  from  the  reading  he  turns  away  with  the 
conviction  that  Ireland's  freedom  must  come, 
not  from  above,  but  from  below. 

In  1896  he  founded  the  Irish  Socialist  Re- 
publican Party. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

ST0EMY   PETEELS 

This  is  not  the  biography  of  a  man,  but  of  a 
movement,  and,  therefore,  only  such  incidents 
in  Connolly's  career  during  the  next  few  years 
need  be  noticed  as  find  a  reflection  in  the  evolu- 
tion of  his  creed.  And  that  there  was  a  consid- 
erable development  of  his  creed  during  the  next 
fifteen  years  may  be  largely  attributed  to  his 
sojourn  in  America.  Before  that  event  Connol- 
ly worked  on  the  customary  lines  of  agitation. 
He  published  extracts  from  the  writings  of  the 
United  Irishmen;  he  ran  a  paper,  the  Work- 
ers' Republic,  which  had  a  fitful  existence  for 
seven  years,  during  which  eighty-five  numbers 
appeared;  he  organised  a  demonstration  against 
the  Jubilee  of  1897,  and  some  turbulent  mani- 
festations on  the  occasion  of  Queen  Victoria's 
visit  to  Ireland  in  1900 ;  he  twice  sought  election 
to  the  Town  Council  of  Dublin  for  the  Wood 
Quay  Ward,  and  was  opposed  and  defeated  by 
the  nominees  of  the  United  Irish  League ;  and 
he  lectured  in  England  and  Scotland.     These 

102 


CONNOLLY  AND  THE  I.  W.  W.     103 

energies  were  not  without  result.  The  move- 
ment became  known ;  its  authors,  indeed,  boast- 
ed most  especially  of  their  abandonment  of  the 
"ridiculous  secrecy' '  in  which  previous  revo- 
lutionary movements  had  been  shrouded,  "and 
in  hundreds  of  speeches  in  the  most  public 
places  of  the  metropolis,  as  well  as  in  scores  of 
thousands  of  pieces  of  literature  scattered 
through  the  country,  the  Socialists  announced 
their  purpose  to  muster  all  the  forces  of  Labour 
for  a  revolutionary  reconstruction. ' '  * 

In  1903  Connolly  went  to  America,  where  he 
remained  for  seven  years,  during  which  he 
worked  as  linotype  operator,  machinist,  insur- 
ance agent  and  so  on,  until  in  1907,  he  formed 
the  Irish  Socialist  Federation,  becoming  its  or- 
ganiser in  the  following  year.  Those  four  years 
were  eventful  for  Ireland,  for  in  them  Connolly 
came  in  touch  with  the  Industrial  "Workers  of 
the  World.  He  then  fell  under  the  influence  of 
Leon,  another  of  whose  disciples  was  Lenin. 

His  wras  an  eclectic  mind,  quick  to  take  im- 
pressions from  its  surroundings,  and  to  apply 
them  to  the  one  dominant  purpose  of  his  life, 
political  and  social  reconstruction.  In  The 
Harp,  the  organ  of  the  Irish  Socialist  Federa- 
tion, he  introduced  the  new  Labour  policy  for 

*  Introduction  to   Erin's  Hope,  American  Edition. 


104  STOKMY  PETRELS 

Ireland,  inviting  the  co-operation  of  all  unsel- 
fish men  and  women  who  worked  for  social 
righteousness.  It  was  not  at  all  necessary  that 
there  should  be  any  particular  trade  mark.  He 
had  come  to  believe  that  the  theoretical  clear- 
ness of  a  few  Socialists  was  not  so  important  as 
the  aroused  class  instincts  and  class  conscious- 
ness of  the  mass  of  the  workers.  He  was  willing 
to  work  with  any  one,  whatever  their  shades  of 
view,  who  would  advance  the  political  and  in- 
dustrial organisation  of  Labour. 

In  nothing  is  the  eclectic  nature  of  Connolly's 
mind  so  evident  as  in  the  effect  upon  it  of  his 
association  with  the  Industrial  Workers  of  the 
World.  He  accepts  the  idea  of  the  one  big 
union,  he  rejects  the  idea  of  internationalism, 
In  both  cases  he  was  evidently  dominated  by  the 
paramount  aim  of  unifying  the  political  and 
economic  revolution  in  Ireland  and  making  it 
effective.  The  passage  in  which  he  rejects 
internationalism  must  be  quoted  as  pro- 
phetic of  what  afterwards  occurred: 

"We  propose  to  show  all  the  workers  of  our 
fighting  race  that  Socialism  will  make  them  bet- 
ter fighters  without  being  less  Irish ;  we  propose 
to  advise  the  Irish  who  are  Socialists  how  to  or- 
ganise their  forces  as  Irish  and  get  again  in 
touch  with  the  organised  bodies  of  literary,  edu- 


BOLSHEVISM  FORESHADOWED   105 

cational,  and  revolutionary  Irish;  we  propose  to 
make  a  campaign  among  our  countrymen  and  to 
rely  for  our  method  mainly  on  imparting  to 
them  a  correct  interpretation  of  the  facts  of 
Irish  history  past  and  present;  we  propose  to 
take  the  control  of  the  Irish  vote  out  of  the  hands 
of  the  slimy  seonini,  who  use  it  to  boost  their  po- 
litical and  business  interests  to  the  undoing  of 
the  Irish  as  well  as  the  American  toiler. ' '  * 

Up  to  this  point  Connolly's  policy,  extreme  as 
it  was,  was  capable  of  being  applied  in  practice 
under  the  ordinarily  accepted  governmental 
forms,  and,  unless  it  be  very  obscurely  implicit 
in  the  constitution  of  the  Irish  Socialist  Repub- 
lican Party,  there  was  nothing  in  his  previous 
writings  to  indicate  that  his  Irish  Socialist  Re- 
public would  materially  depart  from  those  forms. 
But  in  1908  he  produced  a  scheme  in  which  the 
influence  of  the  industrial  extremists  is  clearly 
visible.  It  appeared  first  in  the  Harp  and  was 
afterwards  reprinted  in  Socialism  Made  Easy, 
and  is  so  important  that,  though  lengthy,  it 
must  be  stated  in  Connolly's  own  words: 

"The  political  institutions  of  to-day  are  sim- 
ply the  coercive  forms  of  capitalist  society;  they 

*  The  Harp,  No.  1.  Seonini,  pronounced  shoneens,  an  Irish 
term  of  reproach,  signifying  worthless  fellow.  The  first  italics 
are  ours. 


106  STOEMY  PETEELS 

have  grown  up  out  of  and  are  based  upon  terri- 
torial divisions  of  power  in  the  hands  of  the 
ruling  class  in  past  ages,  and  were  carried  over 
into  capitalist  society  to  suit  the  needs  of  the 
capitalist  class  when  that  class  overthrew 
the  dominion  of  its  predecessors.  The  delega- 
tion of  the  function  of  government  into  the 
hands  of  representatives  elected  from  certain 
districts,  states,  or  territories,  represents  no 
real  natural  division  suited  to  the  requirements 
of  modern  society,  but  is  a  survival  from  a  time 
when  territorial  influences  were  more  potent 
than  industrial  influences,  and  for  that  reason  is 
totally  unsuited  to  the  needs  of  the  new  social 
order,  which  must  be  based  upon  industry.  The 
Socialist  thinker  when  he  paints  the  structural 
form  of  the  new  social  order  does  not  imagine 
an  industrial  system  directed  or  ruled  by  a  body 
of  men  and  women  elected  from  an  indiscrimi- 
nate mass  of  residents  within  given  districts, 
said  residents  working  at  a  heterogeneous  col- 
lection of  trades  and  industries.  To  give  the 
ruling,  controlling,  and  directing  of  industry 
into  the  hands  of  such  a  body  would  be  too  utter- 
ly foolish.  What  the  Socialist  does  realise  is 
that  under  a  Socialist  form  of  society  the  ad- 
ministration of  affairs  will  be  in  the  hands  of 


SOVIETS  107 

representatives  of  the  various  industries  of  the 
nation ;  that  the  workers  in  the  shops  and  facto- 
ries will  organise  themselves  into  unions,  each 
union  comprising  all  the  workers  at  a  given  in- 
dustry ;  that  said  union  will  democratically  con- 
trol the  workshop  life  of  its  own  industry,  elect- 
ing all  foremen,  etc.,  and  regulating  the  routine 
of  labour  in  that  industry  in  subordination  to 
the  needs  of  society  in  general,  to  the  needs  of 
its  allied  trades,  and  to  the  department  of  indus- 
try to  which  it  belongs.  That  representatives 
elected  from  these  various  departments  of  in- 
dustry will  meet  and  form  the  industrial  admin- 
istration or  national  government  of  the  country. 
In  short,  Social  Democracy,  as  its  name  implies, 
is  the  application  to  industry,  or  to  the  social 
life  of  the  nation,  of  the  fundamental  principles 
of  democracy.  Such  application  will  necessarily 
have  to  begin  in  the  workshop,  and  proceed  logi- 
cally and  consecutively  upward  through  all  the 
grades  of  industrial  organisation  until  it  reach- 
es the  culminating  point  of  national  executive 
power  and  direction.  In  other  words,  Socialism 
must  proceed  from  the  bottom  upwards,  where- 
as capitalist  political  society  is  organised  from 
above  downward;  Socialism  will  be  adminis- 
tered by  a  committee  of  experts  elected  from  the 
industries  and  professions  of  the  land ;  capital- 
ist society  is  governed  by  representatives  elect- 


108  STOEMY  PETEELS 

ed  from  districts,  and  is  based  upon  territorial 
division.  The  local  and  national  governing  or 
other  administrative  bodies  of  Socialism  will 
approach  every  question  with  impartial  minds 
armed  with  the  fullest  knowledge  born  of  expe- 
rience;, the  governing  bodies  of  capitalist  so- 
ciety have  to  call  in  an  expensive  professional 
expert  to  instruct  them  on  every  technical  ques- 
tion, and  know  that  the  impartiality  of  said  ex- 
pert varies  with  and  depends  upon  the  size  of 
his  fee. 

' '  It  will  be  seen  that  this  conception  of  Social- 
ism destroys  at  one  blow  all  the  fears  of  a  bu- 
reaucratic State,  ruling  and  ordering  the  lives 
of  every  individual  from  above,  and  thus  gives 
assurance  that  the  social  order  of  the  future  will 
be  an  extension  of  the  freedom  of  the  individual, 
and  not  a  suppression  of  it.  In  short,  it  blends 
the  fullest  democratic  control  with  the  most  ab- 
solute expert  supervision,  something  unthinka- 
ble of  any  society  built  upon  the  political  state." 

Study  of  this  statement  of  policy  enables  us 
to  understand  the  debt  which  in  later  days 
Lenin  confessed  he  owed  to  Connolly,  and  how 
Mr.  de  Blacam  is  able  to  boast  that  Bolshevism 
was  born  in  Ireland.* 

The  period  of  gestation  had  been  long.    Dur- 

*  Aodh  de  Blacam,  Towards  the  Bepublic. 


SOCIALISM  HANGS  FIRE         109 

ing  the  twelve  years  which  had  elapsed  since  the 
founding  of  the  Workers '  Eepublican  Party  the 
movement  had  made  but  slow  headway  in  Ire- 
land, except  among  some  of  the  more  ardent  and 
advanced  thinkers.  The  accredited  leaders  of 
the  trade  unions  frowned  on  the  new  doc- 
trine ;  proposals  that  Labour  should  in  its  cor- 
porate capacity  take  part  in  politics  were  regu- 
larly voted  down  at  the  annual  Congress.  The 
Gaelic  League  and  Sinn  Fein  failed  to  be  at- 
tracted by  Connolly's  appeal  to  the  ancient  so- 
cial tradition  of  the  Gael.  To  this  Connolly's 
absence  contributed ;  when  he  was  translated  to 
America  he  left  no  one  worthy  to  wear  his  cloak. 
Mr.  W.  P.  Ryan  mournfully  speculates  on  what 
might  have  been  had  he  remained  in  Ireland  to 
knit  together  the  intellectual  and  proletarian 
forces  of  evolution.  There  were,  nevertheless, 
as  he  points  out,  influences  at  work  which  were 
gradually  bringing  the  two  together.  Leaving 
out  of  account  Connolly's  extreme  social  opin- 
ions, there  was  much  in  his  reading  of  Irish  his- 
tory— his  appeal  to  Gaelic  tradition  and  his  de- 
testation of  the  Parliamentarians — to  arouse 
the  sympathy  of  Sinn  Fein,  and  men  like  Sheehy 
Skeffington  and  Pearse  had  places  in  both  wings 
of  the  revolutionary  movement. 

The  position  at  the  beginning  of  1907  was 


110  STOEMY  PETEELS 

this.  In  America  Connolly  was  studying  social 
problems,  constructing  a  constitution  from  the 
materials  furnished  by  the  Industrial  Workers 
of  the  World,  and  evolving  philosophic  bases 
for  his  theories.  But  that  alone  was  not 
enough.  The  philosopher  and  theorist  can  point 
the  way,  but  he  cannot  set  the  mass  moving 
along  it.  To  do  that  requires  qualities  in  which 
Connolly  was  then  deficient,  if  indeed  he  ever 
fully  acquired  them.  He  had  his  sympathies,  but 
he  repressed  them  too  rigidly;  he  was  too  much 
the  thinker,  too  precise  in  facts,  too  logical,  ever 
to  become  the  effective  mover  of  men. 

At  this  moment  such  a  man  stepped  upon  the 
Irish  stage,  a  man  knowing  little  of  philosophy 
and  caring  less,  heedless  of  the  past,  reckless  of 
the  future,  looking  only  at  the  present,  and  see- 
ing it  through  eyes  glowing  with  revolutionary 
fire — no  logician,  inconsequent,  perhaps  some- 
times incoherent  in  argument,  but  gifted  with 
burning  speech,  violent,  coarse,  but  singularly 
effective  with  the  people  to  whom  he  spoke.  Like 
Connolly,  James  Larkin  was  a  revolutionary  by 
instinct  and  bitter  experiences  in  the  depths, 
depths  lower  than  ever  Connolly  sounded,  and  a 
rebel  against  British  rule  by  inheritance  from 
his  father,  one  of  Davitt's  comrades  in  the 
abortive  Fenian  plot  against  Chester  Castle. 


JAMES  LAEKIN  111 

Whether  he  was  attracted  by  it  or  whether  he 
created  it,  wherever  Larkin  went  there  was  gen- 
erally trouble.  He  came  to  Belfast  early  in 
1907,  and  before  the  year  was  out  there  were 
serious  strikes  in  that  city,  riots,  military  and 
police  intervention,  and  shooting. 

From  Belfast  as  a  centre  Larkin  opened  up  a 
campaign  in  Dublin.  He  chose  for  his  field  of 
operations  the  trades  at  the  very  bottom  of  the 
social  scale — the  dockers,  carriers  and  casual 
workers,  who  were  unorganised,  neglected  by 
the  skilled  artisans,  and  who  existed  in  the  most 
appalling  surroundings.  To  read  of  these  Dub- 
lin slums  in  a  cold  official  Eeport  is  to  burn  with 
anger,  to  visit  them  is  to  blush  with  shame  for 
the  unhappy  people  who  have  to  be  seen  by  their 
fellow  men  in  such  unspeakable  degradation.  It 
is  not  surprising  that  to  these  men  Larkin  came 
in  the  guise  of  a  missionary,  speaking  to  them  in 
the  language  they  knew  and  could  understand, 
and  all  the  more  effective  because  he  himself 
had  passed  through  the  fire.  As  the  result  of  his 
mission,  and  aided  by  a  strike  in  Cork,  in  which 
he,  of  course,  took  a  hand,  the  Irish  Transport 
and  General  Workers '  Union  was  formed  in  1908. 
It  was  destined  in  later  years  to  become  the 
dominant  factor  in  the  Irish  Labour  Movement. 

Meanwhile  in  the  rural  districts  there  was  a 


112  STOEMY  PETEELS 

growing  unrest  such  as  has  so  often  in  Irish 
history  indicated  the  coming  of  revolutionary 
storms.  Although  the  cattle-driving  movement 
never  attained  the  dimensions  of  the  Land 
League  Campaign,  and  was  free  from  the  sav- 
agery of  the  White  Boy  and  Eibbon  operations, 
it  caused  much  suffering  and  loss  to  its  victims, 
who  were  very  largely  of  the  small  landowning 
and  tenant  class.  It  is  here  mentioned,  not  as  a 
factor  in  the  larger  events  which  followed,  but 
as  indicating  a  general  restlessness  which  fur- 
thered the  purposes  of  those  who  were  aiming  at 
a  social  upheaval.  It  is  also  worth  noticing  be- 
cause its  author,  Mr.  Ginnell,  who  then  sat  in 
Parliament  as  a  Nationalist,  took  the  occasion  to 
denounce  the  Parliamentary  Nationalists  in  un- 
sparing language.  The  United  Irish  League  was, 
he  declared,  corrupt  and  tyrannical.  Its  meth- 
od of  selecting  candidates  was  a  "brazen  impos- 
ture." The  people  were  enslaved  by  corrupt 
leaders,  misrepresented  by  men  who  were  them- 
selves the  slaves  of  others ;  leaders  did  not  dare 
to  be  honest  lest  their  personal  character  should 
be  taken  from  them,  the  voters  were  the  helpless 
tools  of  men  with  private  axes  to  grind,  and 
public  life  was  abhorrent  to  decent  men.* 
It  must  have  been  about  this  time  that  Con- 

*  Land  and  Liberty,  Laurence  Ginnell,  M.P. 


OPENING  THE  CAMPAIGN         113 

nolly,  as  Mr.  Kyan  tells  us,  came  to  the  conclu- 
sion that  his  migration  to  America  had  been  the 
biggest  mistake  of  his  life.  He  must  have  felt 
that  theorising  and  philosophising  in  America 
was  waste  of  time  while  the  leaven  was  ferment- 
ing so  rapidly  in  the  loaf  at  home,  and  that  it 
was  nearly  time  for  him  to  return  and  take  a 
hand  in  the  game  he  had  started  so  long  before. 
As  a  preliminary  he  transferred  his  paper,  The 
Harp,  to  Ireland,  in  January,  1910,  when  it  was 
published  from  the  office  of  the  Irish  Nation, 
with  Larkin  as  sub-editor.  Thus  the  men  of 
theory  and  action  had  come  together,  the  one 
complementary  to  the  other,  a  rare  combina- 
tion for  the  work  they  had  in  hand. 

In  the  Irish  edition  of  the  paper  he  followed 
up  his  American  policy,  laying  less  stress  on 
theoretical  Socialism  than  on  the  development 
of  class  consciousness.  True  to  the  principle  he 
once  enunciated,  that  "the  true  revolutionist 
should  ever  call  into  action  on  his  side  the  entire 
sum  of  all  the  forces  and  factors  of  political  and 
social  discontent,"  he  appealed  to  all  who  de- 
sired political  change  to  co-operate  with  him  in 
his  aims.  To  some  extent  he  succeeded.  Among 
the  disciples  of  Sinn  Fein  were  some  ardent 
spirits  who  chafed  against  the  impotence  of  that 
body  and  welcomed  a  movement  more  virile  and 


114  STORMY  PETRELS 

promising  of  success.  Attracted  in  the  first 
instance  by  these  qualities,  they  gradually  be- 
came more  thoroughly  impregnated  with  Con- 
nolly's economic  doctrines,  and  thus  became  liai- 
son officers  between  the  intellectual  and  physi- 
cal sides  of  the  movement. 

Within  six  months  of  taking  over  the  direction 
of  The  Harp,  Larkin,  as  might  be  expected, 
found  himself  faced  with  about  half  a  dozen  libel 
actions,  and  Connolly  returned  to  Ireland.  From 
that  moment,  though  The  Harp  vanished  before 
the  coming  legal  storm,  events  began  to  move. 
Under  Connolly's  influence  Larkin  became  more 
circumspect,  under  Larkin 's  influence  Connolly 
proclaimed  the  policy  of  "less  philosophising 
and  more  fighting."  In  pursuance  of  that  dic- 
tum he  announced  and  applied  the  doctrine  of 
the  sympathetic  strike  as  a  prelude  to  the  estab- 
lishment of  the  One  Big  Union.  As  an  organ- 
iser of  the  Industrial  Workers  of  the  World,  he 
wrote  in  the  New  Age,  he  had  reached  the  con- 
clusion that  the  interests  of  one  were  the  inter- 
ests of  all,  that  the  hope  of  victory  lay  in  sudden 
and  unexpected  action,  and  that  "no  considera- 
tion of  a  contract  with  a  section  of  the  capitalist 
class  absolved  any  section  of  us  from  the  duty  of 
taking  instant  action  to  protect  other  sections 
when  said  sections  were  in  danger  from  the  cap- 
italist enemy."     He  realised  that  the  workers 


A  CALL  TO  AEMS  115 

would  sustain  many  defeats,  and  that  their  vic- 
tories would  often  be  ephemeral,  but  "the  re- 
sultant moral  effect  would  be  of  incalculable 
value  to  the  character  and  the  mental  attitude 
of  our  class  towards  their  rulers.' ' 

Acting  on  these  lines,  there  were  continual 
strikes  throughout  the  country,  until  the  Trans- 
port Union  and  its  leaders  aroused  the  animos- 
ity not  only  of  employers,  farmers,  and  clergy, 
but  even  of  the  Dublin  Trades  Council  itself. 
Liberty  Hall,  the  headquarters  of  the  Union, 
came  to  be  looked  upon  much  as,  in  these  later 
days,  one  might  regard  a  poison  gas  manufacto- 
ry. But  the  Ishmaelites  pursued  their  course, 
not  only  undisturbed,  but  encouraged  by  the  hos- 
tility they  had  aroused.  In  1911  they  produced 
the  Irish  Worker,  to  replace  the  defunct  Harp, 
in  which  Larkin  wrote  a  ' '  Call  to  Arms ' '  which, 
though  a  somewhat  colourless  example  of  his 
style,  may  be  quoted  in  part  as  indicative  of  his 
method : 

"During  the  recent  skirmish  between  Labour 
and  Capitalism  in  Ireland  you  got  a  foretaste  of 
how  your  bowelless  masters  regard  you.  Their 
kept  Press  spewed  foul  lies,  innuendoes,  and 
gave  space  to  knaves  of  our  own  class  for  the 
purpose  of  garrotting  our  glorious  movement. 
At  present  you  spend  your  lives  in  sordid  labour 
and  have  your  abode  in  filthy  slums ;  your  chil- 


116  STOEMY  PETEELS 

dren  hunger  and  your  masters  say  yonr  slavery 
must  endure  for  ever.  If  you  would  come  out  of 
bondage,  yourself  must  forge  the  weapons  and 
fight  the  grim  battle. ' ' 

Coincidentally  with  these  activities  the  allies 
addressed  themselves  to  the  task  of  making 
Labour  a  political  force.  As  mentioned  before, 
the  Trade  Union  Congress  had  always  rejected 
the  idea,  but  Connolly  set  to  work  to  break 
down  the  opposition.  A  Dublin  Labour  Party 
was  formed  "to  unite  the  forces  of  Labour  in 
order  to  secure  the  election  of  independent  La- 
bour representatives  to  Parliament  and  local 
government  bodies."  The  idea  caught  on:  in 
the  first  municipal  election  after  its  formation 
the  new  party  secured  the  election  of  nine  of  its 
candidates,  including  Larkin,  and  at  the  Clonmel 
Labour  Congress  of  1912  a  motion  to  found  an 
Irish  Labour  Party,  independent  of  all  other 
parties,  was  carried  by  a  majority  of  more  than 
two  to  one.  From  that  time  the  annual  Con- 
gress meetings  became  more  and  more  engaged 
with  political  questions,  both  national  and  inter- 
national, and  entered  into  relations  with  the 
British  Labour  Party  with  reference  to  ques- 
tions before  Parliament,  more  especially  those 
relating  to  Ireland.  During  1912  nominees  of 
the  Labour  Party  secured  seats  in  many  towns, 
including  Belfast,  Cork,  Sligo,  Wexford,  and 


THE  DUBLIN  STRIKE  117 

Waterf ord,  and  in  the  following  year  the  title  of 
the  organisation  was  changed  to  Irish  Trade 
Union  Congress  and  Labour  Party. 

Into  the  great  Dublin  strike  of  1913  we  do  not 
propose  to  enter  in  detail.  It  was  a  desperate 
struggle,  fought  out  through  many  months  with 
fierce  determination  on  both  sides.  Every  con- 
ceivable weapon,  even  including  religion,  was 
brought  into  play.  There  were  rights  and 
wrongs  on  both  sides,  both  sides  committed  er- 
rors, and  neither  could  claim  a  decisive  victory. 
From  our  present  point  of  view,  however,  its 
importance  lies  in  this,  that  "it  was  the  great 
turning  point  in  the  history  of  the  working  class 
in  Ireland,  and  helped  to  give  the  workers  of 
Ireland  their  place  in  the  front  ranks  of  the 
world  army  of  militant  andinsurgent Labour.' '  * 

It  was,  indeed,  in  the  nature  of  a  rehearsal 
for  the  greater  tragedy  to  be  played  three  years 
later.  During  the  struggle  the  strikers  had  come 
into  frequent  conflict  with  the  police  and  had 
suffered  heavily.  It  was  suggested  that  the 
workers  should  be  armed  and,  acting  on  the  sug- 
gestion, Connolly  conceived  the  idea  of  the  Citi- 
zen Army,  which  was  organised  by  Captain 
White,  son  of  the  defender  of  Ladysmith. 

*  Ireland  at  Berne.  Eeports  presented  to  the  International 
Labour  and  Socialist  Conference  held  at  Berne,  February,  1919. 
Issued  by  the  authority  of  the  Irish  Labour  Party  and  Trade 
Union  Congress. 


CHAPTER  IX 


UNDERCURRENTS 


We  have  now  followed  from  their  sources  to 
the  year  1913  two  revolutionary  currents,  the 
one  a  brawling  torrent,  the  other  a  sedate  and 
sluggish  stream,  destined  soon  to  meet  though 
not  for  several  years  to  mingle ;  we  have  seen 
how  the  proletarian  torrent  spent  itself  in  its 
mad  rush,  and  it  now  remains  to  see  how  the 
sluggish  intellectual  movement  stood  at  the 
opening  of  that  year.  And  here  we  approach 
the  realm  of  inference.  Hitherto  it  has  been 
possible  to  describe  the  policy  and  objects  of 
Sinn  Fein  and  Labour  in  the  words  of  its  ac- 
credited leaders.  Henceforth  there  are  under- 
currents, the  influence  of  which  is  apparent,  but 
which  are  of  necessity  obscure.  BntbuSinn  Fein 
and  Connolly,  as  we  have  seen,  prided  them- 
selves on  their  publicity,  but  there  came  a  time 
when  publicity  became  impossible  for  them,  as  it 
becomes  impossible  some  time  or  another  for 
those  who  are  plotting  revolution. 

118 


SINN  FEIN  WAKES  UP  119 

At  what  precise  moment  Sinn  Fein  began  to 
contemplate  revolution  it  is  impossible  to  say. 
Eebellious  it  bad  always  been  in  theory,  but  it  is 
one  thing  to  contemplate  revolt  as  an  abstract 
proposition  and  another  to  take  the  grim  meas- 
ures to  put  it  into  operation.  When  1913  opened, 
and  with  it  the  second  stage  of  the  fight  over 
the  Home  Eule  Bill,  the  Sinn  Fein  leaders  cer- 
tainly did  not  contemplate  armed  rebellion.  To 
begin  with,  they  were  not  in  a  position  to  do  so, 
and  they  knew  it.  The  excitement  of  the  parlia- 
mentary fight  was  driving  everything  else  out 
of  the  minds  of  the  people.  Sinn  .Fein  was  neg- 
lected, impotent  and  penniless.  It  is  important 
to  note  the  latter  fact  in  view  of  the  sudden 
affluence  which  so  soon  followed.  Its  leaders 
hated  the  Parliamentarians  and  detested  the 
Home  Rule  Bill.  Mr.  Redmond-Howard,  in- 
deed, tries  to  minimise  their  opposition  to  his 
uncle's  policy.  He  says  that  Sinn  Fein  with- 
drew from  opposition  lest  it  should  be  said  that 
in  a  moment  of  acute  difficulty  it  had  hampered 
any  Irishman  in  winning  any  liberties  for  Ire- 
land, and  its  daily  paper  was  withdrawn.*  Mr. 
0  'Hegarty  takes  a  different  view  of  its  action. 
The  daily  paper  was  withdrawn,  not  to  save  Mr. 
Redmond  embarrassment,  but  for  lack  of  funds ; 

*  Six  Days  of  the  Irish  Republic,  p.  76. 


120  UNDERCURRENTS 

the  Sinn  Feiners  marked  time  because  they 
knew  well  that  "the  issue  would  be  unfavour- 
able to  the  continued  adhesion  of  the  country  to 
the  Parliamentarian  policy."*  Both  writers 
agree  that  Sinn  Fein  was  giving  Mr.  Redmond 
a  chance,  but  according  to  Mr.  0  'Hegarty  it  was 
a  chance  to  hang  himself,  not  to  win  Ireland's 
liberties.  Nor  is  this  conclusion  vitiated  by  an 
article  by  Mr.  Arthur  Griffith  in  the  Irish  Re- 
view of  May,  1912.  In  that  article  he  condemned 
the  Home  Rule  Bill,  but  added,  "If  the  Bill  be 
amended  to  give  Ireland  real  control  of  her  soil 
and  taxes  and  power  of  initiation  in  her  legisla- 
tion, I  shall  welcome  its  passage  as  a  measure 
for  the  improvement  of  conditions  in  Ireland, 
and  a  step  clearing  the  way  to  a  final  settlement 
between  the  two  nations. ' ' 

This,  after  all,  was  no  more  than  a  reasser- 
tion  of  his  willingness  to  accept  Grattan's  Par- 
liament, which,  as  we  have  seen,  he  had  induced 
Sinn  Fein  to  embody  in  its  programme.  But, 
though  Mr.  Griffith  held  that  comparatively 
moderate  view  himself,  it  was  with  difficulty  that 
he  got  his  colleagues  to  accept  it  in  1905,  and  it 
is  more  than  doubtful  if  he  could  have  got  a  ma- 
jority for  it  in  1913.  For  during  the  intervening 
period  Sinn  Fein  had  shed  many  of  its  most 

*  Sinn  Fein,  p.  38. 


FENIANISM  STEPS  IN  121 

moderate  elements.  Some  had  gone  owing  to 
the  cry  that  Sinn  Fein  was  anti-clerical;  others 
had  retired  discouraged  by  the  slump  in  its  for- 
tunes after  the  short-lived  boom  of  1907-8 ;  many 
left  to  join  Mr.  Kedmond  when  the  Home  Eule 
Bill  was  introduced,  on  the  ground  that  half  a 
loaf  was  better  than  no  bread,  and  that,  though 
the  Bill  itself  might  not  be  wholly  satisfactory, 
it  would  provide  a  jumping-oif  place  for  further 
developments.  And,  while  these  influences  were 
at  work  within  the  party  to  eliminate  the  mod- 
erates, there  were  external  influences  at  work  to 
make  those  who  remained  more  extreme  in  their 
views.  Some  fell  under  the  influence  of  Connol- 
ly's movement,  attracted  by  his  presentation  of 
Irish  history,  his  appeal  to  the  old  Gaelic  social 
system,  and  his  insistence  on  the  principle  of  na- 
tionality. Others,  whom  his  extreme  communis- 
tic doctrines  repelled,  fell  under  American  Fe- 
nian influence,  always  ready  to  seize  every 
chance  to  foment  trouble  in  Ireland.  It  is  nota- 
ble that  during  this  period  the  extreme  Irish 
Party  in  America  was  divided  into  two  sections, 
that  represented  by  the  Irish  World,  backing 
Mr.  Kedmond,  the  other,  represented  by  the 
Gaelic  American,  supporting  Sinn  Fein. 

While,  therefore,  at  the  beginning  of  1913 
Sinn  Fein  was  inconspicuous,  penniless,  and 


122  UNDERCURRENTS 

infinitely  less  strong  than  it  had  been  five  years 
earlier,  and  while  Mr.  Griffiths '  views  remained 
substantially  unchanged,  it  is  certain  that  in 
spirit  it  was  more  unyielding  and  uncompro- 
mising, and  that  it  was  moving,  though  perhaps 
very  slowly,  from  intellectual  theories  to  more 
practical  measures. 

It  was  at  this  juncture  that  Sir  Roger  Case- 
ment came  to  Ireland,  on  his  retirement  from 
the  British  Consular  Service.  No  more  sinister 
figure  ever  stepped  upon  the  Irish  stage  than 
this  British  officer  who  came  to  play  a  dual  role, 
that  of  an  Irish  rebel  and  a  German  agent. 
Whether  he  was  more  the  Irish  patriot  or  the 
German  agent  it  is  not  easy  to  decide,  nor  is  it 
necessary,  for  it  was  Casement's  good  fortune 
to  find  his  domestic  policy  and  his  foreign  obli- 
gations moving  together  towards  a  common  goal 
— the  liberation  of  Ireland  and  the  placing  of 
Great  Britain  under  the  heel  of  Germany. 

In  respect  of  Irish  politics  Casement's  pro- 
clivities were  akin  to  those  of  the  Gaelic  League 
and  Sinn  Fein.  His  entry  into  the  national 
arena  roughly  synchronised  with  the  founda- 
tion of  the  League  with  whose  literary  aims  he 
was  in  sympathy.  He  was  one  of  those  who  from 
this  beginning  developed  into  hostility  to  the 
parliamentary  movement  and  to  British  rule,  of 


CASEMENT  123 

which  he  was  nowhere  much  enamoured.  Dur- 
ing his  trial  it  was  suggested  both  by  himself 
and  his  counsel  that  the  action  which  brought 
him  to  the  scaffold  was  the  action  of  a  patriot 
driven  to  unfortunate  measures  by  the  arming 
of  the  Ulster  Volunteers  and  the  disappointment 
of  his  political  hopes.  Under  these  influences,  so 
went  the  theory,  he  turned  to  Germany  merely 
because  Germany  was  then  at  war  with  Eng- 
land, and  because  he  thought  he  might  find 
among  the  Irish  prisoners  of  war  men  who 
would  range  themselves  on  the  side  of  the  Irish 
Volunteers.  The  allegation  that  he  ever  sought 
to  enlist  Irish  soldiers  to  fight  against  England 
was  stoutly  denied;  all,  it  was  protested,  that  he 
ever  desired  was  to  induce  them,  when  the  war 
was  over,  and  if  necessity  unhappily  arose,  to 
enlist  them  to  fight  for  Ireland.  That  ingenious 
theory  vanishes  into  thin  air  the  moment  it  is 
examined  in  the  light  of  Casement's  career,  and 
the  activities  on  which  he  entered  immediately 
upon  his  arrival  in  Ireland  in  1903. 

From  an  early  period  of  his  life  Casement  fell 
under  German  influence.  He  was  associated 
with  Mr.  Morel  in  the  Congo  atrocity  agitation, 
a  campaign  doubtless  humanitarian,  but  curi- 
ously subserving  Germany's  twofold  purpose 
of   generating   ill-will   between   Belgium   and 


124  UNDEBCUEBENTS 

Great  Britain  and  of  suggesting  the  blessedness 
of  German  Kultnr  as  an  alternative  to  Belgian 
barbarity.  Casement  was  an  ardent  auxiliary 
to  Mr.  Morel.  British  journalists,  who  were  not 
reticent  in  their  criticisms  of  Belgian  rule,  were 
surprised  and  bored  by  his  haunting  of  news- 
paper offices  and  the  way  in  which  he  urged  them 
to  more  vigorous  measures.  (It  was  only  after 
1916  that  his  motives  began  to  dawn  upon 
them.)  The  allies  of  the  Congo  then  parted, 
Morel  to  devote  his  energies  to  the  development 
of  German  influence  in  Morocco,  Casement  to 
play  a  like  part  in  relation  to  Ireland. 

The  connection  between  Casement  and  Ger- 
many, begun  in  West  Africa,  became  closer  and 
more  varied  in  succeeding  years.  His  family 
was  connected  with  Germany  by  marriage,  he 
himself  had  business  interests  in  that  country, 
and  was  on  very  intimate  relations  with  Ger- 
mans in  high  positions,  including  Herr  Bal- 
lin,  the  head  of  the  Hamburg- American  line  and 
a  personal  friend  of  the  Kaiser,  a  very  singular 
fact  seeing  that  he  was  unacquainted  with  the 
German  language. 

One  other  point,  and  this  brief  review  of 
Casement's  antecedents  may  close.  Holding 
the  views  he  did,  he  accepted  an  offer  of  knight- 
hood from  the  King  with,  it  is  said,  some  scru- 


HAIL,  MASTER  125 

pies  of  conscience.  In  his  trial  lie  found  himself 
under  the  necessity  of  explaining  his  action,  and 
did  so  by  saying  that  he  could  not  refuse.  That 
statement  was  untrue.  Both  before  and  since 
his  time  men  have  respectfully  declined  similar 
offers.  There  is  living  a  distinguished  man  of 
letters  who  declined  an  honour  even  after  it 
had  appeared  in  the  Gazette.  Casement  did  not 
decline,  he  accepted  the  offer  in  terms  which 
have  been  euphemistically  described  as  "  court- 
ly,' '  but  which  would  be  more  correctly  de- 
scribed as  servile.  The  language  of  his  reply 
is  the  language  of  a  man  who,  plotting  treason, 
desires  to  disarm  suspicion: 

"I  find  it  very  hard  to  choose  the  words  in 
which  to  make  acknowledgment  of  the  honour 
done  me  by  the  King.  I  am  much  moved  at  the 
proof  of  confidence  and  appreciation  of  my  serv- 
ice on  the  Putumayo  conveyed  to  me  by  your 
letter,  wherein  you  tell  me  that  the  King  had 
been  graciously  pleased  upon  your  recommen- 
dation to  confer  upon  me  the  honour  of  knight- 
hood. I  am,  indeed,  grateful  to  you  for  this 
signal  assurance  of  your  personal  esteem  and 
support.  I  am  very  deeply  sensible  of  the  hon- 
our done  to  me  by  His  Majesty.  I  would  beg 
that  my  humble  duty  might  be  presented  to  His 
Majesty  when  you  may  do  me  the  honour  to  con- 


126  UNDEBCUEBENTS 

vey  him  my  deep  appreciation  of  the  honour  he 
has  been  so  graciously  pleased  to  confer  upon 
me." 

And  having  written  this  letter  we  are  in- 
formed that  he  never  even  opened  the  parcel 
which  contained  the  insignia.*  If  he  were  not 
then  conscious  of  treason,  why  did  he  not  even 
examine  the  symbol  of  the  honour  he  had  accept- 
ed with  such  abject  gratitude?  It  may  be  a 
redeeming  point  in  his  moral  character,  but  it  is 
very  suggestive  of  his  political  guilt.  In  that 
very  year  he  was  plotting  with  Professor  Kuno 
Meyer,  who  was  undoubtedly  a  German  agent, 
to  prevent  a  rapprochement  between  the  United 
States  and  Great  Britain  and  to  embroil  the  re- 
lations between  the  two  countries.  He  also 
wrote  the  first  of  a  series  of  remarkable  articles, 
entitled  l '  Ireland,  Germany  and  the  Freedom  of 
the  Seas,"  to  prove  that  Ireland's  hope  of  free- 
dom and  the  liberty  of  the  world  lay  in  alliance 
between  Germany  and  Ireland  to  procure  the 
downfall  of  the  British  Empire.  These  articles 
appeared  in  the  Gaelic  American  after  the  out- 
break of  war,  and  will  be  referred  to  again 
later. 

In  1913  Germany  was  making  feverish  though 
secret,  preparations  for  the  great  adventure. 

*  The  Irish  Rebellion  of  1916,  Wells  and  Marlowe. 


GERMAN  INTRIGUE  127 

Twice  during  the  preceding  six  years  she  had 
put  out  feelers  in  North  Africa,  to  draw  them 
in  again  when  she  found  the  ground  not  suffi- 
ciently prepared.  Not  all  the  efforts  of  Morel 
could  convince  the  world  that  Morocco  could 
only  survive  under  the  influence  of  Teutonic 
Kultur.  Her  path  to  world-empire  lay  elsewhere, 
and  she  was  getting  ready  for  the  journey  while 
her  agents  and  emissaries  smoothed  the  way 
and  blazed  the  trail.  Just  as  in  Belgium  and 
France  her  engineers  were  secretly  making  con- 
crete foundations  for  the  big  guns  of  1914,  so 
throughout  the  world  her  agents  were  purchas- 
ing spies  and  promoting  disaffection  among  her 
potential  foes.  Her  missionaries  and  consuls 
were  busy  in  India,  there  were  intrigues  in 
South  Africa,  in  every  land  under  the  British 
flag — for  England  was  the  enemy — spies  were  at 
their  work.  It  was  not  likely  that  the  Hun,  thor- 
ough in  all  that  was  underhand,  would  omit  so 
promising  a  sphere  of  operations  as  Ireland. 

For  Ireland  was  Great  Britain's  Achilles' 
heel,  alike  by  her  strategical  position  and  the 
temper  of  her  people.  Philip  of  Spain,  Louis 
of  France,  the  Directory,  all  had  been  ready  to 
use  Irish  disaffection  against  England,  their 
enemy.  In  St.  Helena  Napoleon  lamented  his 
failure  to  copy  their  example.    "Had  I  gone  to 


128  UNDEBCUBBENTS 

Ireland  instead  of  Egypt  the  Empire  was  at  an 
end."  As  it  was  in  the  sixteenth,  seventeenth, 
and  eighteenth  centuries,  so  Germany  meant 
that  it  should  be  in  the  twentieth,  and  Casement 
went  to  Ireland  to  fulfil  the  plan.  It  is  possible 
that  he  desired  to  serve  what  he  conceived  to  be 
Ireland's  interests,  but  it  is  certain  that  he  was 
anxious  to  serve  the  interests  of  Germany. 
During  the  year  before  the  war  in  all  the  arti- 
cles in  the  Sinn  Fein  papers  that  can  be  traced 
to  his  pen  there  is  only  one — and  that  a  vile  and 
filthy  attack  upon  Lord  Boberts — which  is  not 
concerned  with  Germany. 

Almost  immediately  after  his  arrival  in  Ire- 
land he  opened  his  campaign  with  an  article  in 
the  Irish  Review,  which  has  often  been  quoted, 
entitled ' '  Ireland,  Germany  and  the  Next  War. ' ' 
The  article  was  signed  ' l  Shan  Van  Vocht, '  '  but 
there  is  no  doubt  that  it  was  written  by  Case- 
ment. In  this  he  discussed  the  thesis  that  it 
would  be  to  Ireland's  interest  to  support  Great 
Britain  in  the  event  of  a  war  because,  were  Brit- 
ain defeated,  she  would  either  remain  attached 
to  England  and  so  have  to  share  the  burden  of 
defeat,  or  she  would  become  the  prey  of  the  vic- 
tor. "Shan  Van  Vocht"  rejected  this  thesis, 
pointing  out  that  there  was  a  third  alternative 
i — viz.,  that  Ireland  might  be  separated  from 


CASEMENT'S  PLAN  129 

Great  Britain  and  established  under  European 
guarantees  as  a  neutralised,  independent  Euro- 
pean State. 

"With  Great  Britain  cut  off  and  the  Irish  Sea 
held  by  German  squadrons,  no  power  from  with- 
in could  maintain  any  effective  resistance  to  a 
German  occupation  of  Dublin  and  a  military 
occupation  of  the  island.  To  convert  that  into 
a  permanent  administration  could  not  be  op- 
posed from  within,  and,  with  Great  Britain 
down  and  severed  from  Ireland  by  a  victorious 
German  Navy,  it  is  obvious  that  opposition  to 
the  permanent  retention  of  Ireland  by  the  victor 
must  come  from  without.  It  is  equally  obvious 
that  it  would  come  from  without,  and  it  is  for 
this  international  reason  that,  I  think,  a  perma- 
nent German  annexation  of  any  part  of  the  Unit- 
ed Kingdom  need  not  be  seriously  feared.  Such 
a  complete  change  in  the  political  geography  of 
Europe  as  a  German-owned  Ireland  could  not 
but  provoke  universal  alarm  and  a  widespread 
combination  to  forbid  its  realisation.,, 

He  then  goes  on  to  point  out  that  Germany 
would  have  to  attain  her  end,  "the  permanent 
disabling  of  the  maritime  supremacy  of  Great 
Britain, "  by  the  less  provocative  measure  of  es- 
tablishing Ireland  as  a  neutralised,  independent 
State  under  international  control.  This  he  con- 
sidered would  be  an  arrangement  that  "a  Peace 


130  UNDERCURRENTS 

Congress  should,  in  the  end,  be  glad  to  ratify 
at  the  instance  of  a  victorious  Germany." 

Those  who  have  read  the  works  of  General 
Bernhardi  will  realise  how  frail  would  have  been 
that  international  combination  on  which  Ireland 
was  to  depend  for  her  independence.  For  Ger- 
many's plans  did  not  contemplate  the  existence 
of  any  European  Power  that  would  be  in  any 
position  to  thwart  or  bend  her  purpose. 

"Shan  Van  Vocht"  admits  that  Germany 
would  consult  her  own  interests: 

"That  Germany  should  propose  this  form  of 
dissolution  in  any  interest  but  her  own,  or  for 
the  beaux  yeux  of  Ireland,  I  do  not  for  a  mo- 
ment assert." 

But  he  goes  on  to  say  that  a  neutralised  Ire- 
land would  serve  Germany's  plans,  while  she 
would  also  be  consulting  the  "normal  and  intel- 
lectual" claims  of  Ireland.  He  sets  forth  his 
opinion  in  the  following  delicious  sentence : 

1 '  Germany  would  attain  her  ends  as  the  cham- 
pion of  National  Liberty  and  could  destroy 
England's  naval  supremacy  for  all  time  by  an 
act  of  irreproachable  morality." 

On  such  slender  security  as  German  morality 
was  Ireland  bidden  to  rally  to  "the  champion 
of  National  Liberty."  These  are  the  words  of  a 
German  agent  enlisting  recruits  for  his  employ- 


BEBNHARDI  APPBO.VES  131 

er  rather  tlian  of  an  Irish  patriot  enlisting  an 
ally  for  his  cause. 

This  article,  which  appeared  in  July,  was  sent 
to  General  Bernhardi  by  an  anonymous  cor- 
respondent— it  is  not  difficult  to  guess  his  iden- 
tity— with  a  request  that  he  should  notice  it. 
The  General  did  so  in  September  in  the  columns 
of  the  Berliner  Post: 

"To-day,  indeed,  German  policy  seems  to  be 
steering  full  sail  towards  an  arrangement  with 
England,  but  as  the  goal  could  not  be  reached 
without  the  abandonment  of  our  whole  future 
as  a  world-Power,  it  is  valuable  for  the  real- 
politiker  to  examine  exhaustively  both  the 
strength  and  the  weakness  of  England/ ' 

He  found  signs  of  these  "weaknesses"  in 
various  parts  of  the  world,  such  as  India,  Egypt 
and  elsewhere,  and  then  he  continues : 

"It  is  not  without  interest  to  know  that,  if  it 
ever  comes  to  a  war  with  England,  Germany 
will  have  allies  in  the  enemy 's  camp  itself,  who 
in  the  given  circumstances  are  resolved  to  bar- 
gain, and  in  any  case  will  constitute  a  grave 
anxiety  for  England  and  perhaps  tie  fast  a  por- 
tion of  the  English  troops.  This  is  no  time  for 
Germany  to  pursue  a  policy  of  renunciation. ' ' 

General  Bernhardi  was  duly  rebuked  by  the 
official  Press  for  his  frankness,  but  "Shan  Van 


132  UNDEBCUKEENTS 

Vocht"  had  attained  his  purpose,  and  from  that 
time  forth  the  columns  of  Irish  Freedom*  the 
organ  of  the  Sinn  Fein  extremists  and  of  Case- 
ment himself,  teem  with  references  to  Germany 
as  the  saviour,  and  Ireland  became  the  happy 
hunting  ground  of  German  Press  correspond- 
ents and  spies. 

With  all  these  Casement  was  in  close  relation. 
Especially  would  it  seem  that  he  was  intimate 
with  a  certain  Baron  Von  Horst,  of  the  nature 
of  whose  mission  in  England  there  is  no  possi- 
ble doubt.  This  man  was  of  middle-class  origin 
who  had  established  a  business  in  England,  and 
who  was  ennobled  for  some  mysterious  reason, 
though  indeed  the  mystery  is  not  impenetrable 
in  view  of  his  operations.  During  his  sojourn 
in  England  he  developed  a  remarkable  taste  for 
British  politics,  and  it  is  notable  that  his  sym- 
pathies were  invariably  with  those  whose  pa- 
triotism was  dubious  and  whose  desire  to  make 
trouble  was  evident.  At  one  time  he  financed 
the  Herald,  which  was  being  run  by  Mr.  George 
Lansbury,  and  over  which  every  one  who  had 
touched  it  financially  had  burned  his  fingers. 

*  This  paper  was  controlled  by  Maedermott  and  James 
Connolly.  The  former  was  a  Sinn  Feiner,  so  that  this  com- 
bination represented  the  alliance  between  the  intellectual  and 
proletarian  movements.  Both  men  were  signatories  to  the 
Proclamation  of  the  Irish  Republic  in  1916. 


BAEON  VON  HOEST  133 

Undeterred  by  these  painful  examples,  this  be- 
nevolent foreigner  found  money  for  Mr.  Lans- 
bury,  and  lost  it.  On  the  occasion  of  the  dock 
strike,  which  resulted  in  the  transfer  of  a  good 
deal  of  trade  from  the  Thames  to  the  Elbe,  the 
big-hearted  Baron  subscribed  to  the  strike  fund 
on  a  scale  incommensurate  with  his  means. 
Among  his  other  enterprises  he  had  a  cinema 
theatre,  which  later  became  a  meeting  place  for 
revolutionaries,  or  for  any  one  likely  to  make 
trouble  for  the  authorities.  He  also,  some  two 
months  or  so  before  the  war,  attempted  to  pur- 
chase rifles  from  a  dealer  in  London,  declaring 
himself  to  be  the  initiator  of  the  Irish  Volun- 
teers. The  deal,  however,  did  not  come  off  when 
his  nationality  was  revealed.  Baron  Von 
Horst's  career  in  Ireland  finally  terminated  in 
August,  1914,  when  he  was  arrested  for  dis- 
tributing anti-recruiting  literature  and  interned. 
In  these  and  similar  activities  Baron  Von 
Horst  had  the  valuable  assistance  of  a  Miss 
Lillian  Troy  of  California.  When  the  Irish 
question  threatened  to  develop  into  serious  trou- 
ble, these  inseparable  comrades  threw  them- 
selves into  the  fray,  as  always,  on  the  anti-Brit- 
ish side.  It  was  not  long  before  the  trio  found 
a  subject  which  by  great  good  fortune  served  the 
double  purpose   of  abusing  England  and  of 


134  UNDEECUEEENTS 

pointing  to  Germany  as  the  appointed  saviour 
of  Ireland. 

The  Cunard  Company  gave  notice  of  its  in- 
tention to  discontinue  the  practice  of  calling  at 
Queenstown,  in  this  doing  just  what  the  White 
Star  Line  had  done  previously.  Casement  at 
once  made  the  heavens  ring  with  his  protests, 
and  Baron  Von  Horst  and  Miss  Troy  joined  in 
the  chorus.  The  action  of  the  company  was 
only  part  of  Britain's  steadfast  policy  to  injure 
Ireland's  trade  and  to  isolate  her  from  the 
world.  But  it  was  a  happy  circumstance  that 
Germany  was  animated  by  no  such  selfish  pur- 
pose. The  Hamburg- Amerika  line  would  call  at 
Queenstown  and  redress  Ireland's  wrong.  Thus 
would  England's  machinations  be  defeated,  and 
the  visits  of  the  German  liners  would  link  up 
Ireland  with  the  continent  of  Europe,  opening 
up  new  avenues  of  trade  and  vistas  of  prosper- 
ity. Miss  Troy  wrote  in  Sinn  Fein  an  eulogium 
of  the  noble  services  of  Yon  Horst  and  Case- 
ment, praising  the  energy  with  which  the  latter 
had  pressed  Ireland's  case  upon  Herr  Ballin, 
and  extolling  the  skill  and  bravery  of  the  Ger- 
man sailors  in  facing  a  harbour  which  English 
captains  were  afraid  to  enter.  And  then  the 
Sinn  Fein  papers  took  up  the  tale,  prompted  no 
doubt  by  the  ingenious  operators  of  the  scheme. 


THE  QUEENSTOWN  " STUNT' '      135 

The  coming  of  the  German  liners,  it  was  said, 
would  lead  to  the  establishment  of  close  trade 
relations  between  Ireland  and  Germany.  No 
longer  would  Ireland  be  compelled  to  sell  her 
goods  to  England,  her  only  customer,  at  an 
alarming  sacrifice.  Her  cattle  would  cross  the 
North  Sea  and  fetch  £2  a  head  more  than  they 
did  in  Liverpool  and  Bristol.  No  one  explained, 
and  indeed  no  one  inquired  why,  if  Germany 
wanted  beef  she  did  not  send  to  Ireland  and  get 
it  where  prices  ruled  so  low;  no  one  asked 
whether,  as  a  fact,  Germany  needed  to  import 
cattle  from  oversea,  or  why  England,  which  was 
searching  every  continent  for  food,  and  bring- 
ing livestock  thousands  of  miles,  should  be  able 
to  buy  Irish  cattle  so  cheap.  It  was  enough  that 
England  was  being  attacked,  and  Casement  was 
happy  enough  to  win  great  commendation  from 
his  countrymen  and  high  credit  from  the  for- 
eigner whose  cause  he  so  ably  served. 

What  may  be  called  the  '  *  Queenstown  stunt ' ' 
and  the  article  in  the  Irish  Review  admirably 
prepared  the  way  for  that  momentous  step — the 
formation  of  the  Irish  Volunteers.  From  that 
moment  Sinn  Fein  ceased  to  be  a  purely  intel- 
lectual movement,  and  became  an  active  revo- 
lutionary force. 

There  have  been  conflicting  opinions  as  to  the 


136  UNDERCURRENTS 

motives  which  underlay  the  formation  of  the 
Irish  Volunteers.  The  natural  theory  and  the 
one  generally  accepted  at  the  time,  was  that  they 
were  to  be  used  against  the  Ulster  Volunteer 
Force.  It  may  well  be  that  some  of  those  who 
enlisted  cherished  the  same  idea,  and  perhaps, 
like  the  Ribbonmen  of  some  fifty  years  before, 
contemplated  the  possibility  of  wading  in  Or- 
angemen's blood. 

But  these  theories  are  wrong.  Mr.  0  'Hegarty 
is  very  emphatic  in  his  denial  of  any  intention 
to  fight  Ulster.  "They  did  not  establish  the 
Irish  Volunteers  as  a  counter-blast  to  the  Ulster 
Volunteers,  or  with  any  idea  of  either  fighting 
or  overawing  Ulster."  The  Ulster  Volunteers 
counted  for  this  much  in  the  formation  of  their 
Southern  rivals — they  encouraged  those  who 
wanted  to  have  an  armed  force  to  make  the  at- 
tempt to  form  one.  As  the  Government,  so  went 
the  calculation,  had  permitted  the  Ulstermen 
to  create  a  Volunteer  force,  "there  was  a  sport- 
ing chance ' '  that  it  would  not  prohibit  the  for- 
mation of  a  similar  body  in  the  South  of  Ire- 
land.* It  may  have  been  present  to  the  minds 
of  those  who  wished  to  arouse  more  bitter  feel- 
ings against  England  that  such  a  prohibition 
would  admirably  serve  their  purpose.     As  a 

*  O  'Hegarty,  Sinn  Fein. 


A  NATIONAL  AEMY  137 

fact  Sinn  Fein  was  disposed  to  be  grateful  for 
the  opportunity.  In  the  Manifesto  of  November 
25th,  1913,  which  called  for  Volunteers,  the  con- 
ditions created  by  the  Ulster  movement  were  de- 
scribed as  "not  altogether  unfortunate. ' '  The 
Manifesto  also  contained  words  which  show  that 
the  real  object  of  the  promoters  was  not  tempo- 
rary action  in  reference  to  the  Home  Eule  Bill, 
but  something  more  far-reaching.  "The  Vol- 
unteers, once  they  have  been  enrolled,  will  form 
a  permanent  element  in  the  national  life  under 
a  National  Government. ' '  When  it  is  remem- 
bered that  the  Home  Eule  Bill,  for  which  Mr. 
Eedmond  was  then  battling,  particularly  pro- 
hibited the  maintenance  of  armed  forces  by  the 
Irish  Government,  this  sentence  is  significant. 
It  becomes  perfectly  clear  that  the  kind  of  Na- 
tional Government  which  the  Irish  Volunteers 
were  to  serve  was  not  the  kind  of  National  Gov- 
ernment which  the  British  would  be  at  all  likely 
to  grant. 

Among  the  founders  of  the  Irish  Volunteers 
there  were  moderate  men,  who  never  contem- 
plated, and  would  have  shrunk  in  abhorrence 
from  anything  revolutionary.  There  always  are 
such  moderate  men  in  revolutionary  enter- 
prises, men  whose  moderation  makes  them  use- 
ful auxiliaries  outside,  but  whose  moderation 


138  UNDERCURRENTS 

excludes  them  from  the  inner  council.  They 
think  they  are  leaders,  while  really  they  are  only 
decoys.  One  of  them,  Col.  Moore,  formerly  of 
the  Connaught  Eangers,  in  later  days  described 
the  personnel  of  the  original  Committee,  of 
abont  twenty-five.  It  took  him  two  or  three 
days  "to  size  them  up  and  separate  the 
groups."    And  he  thus  describes  them: 

"There  were  about  two  extremists  and  four 
or  five  boys  under  their  domination.  .  .  .  Five 
or  six  Sinn  Feiners  were  in  a  separate  group ; 
they  might  be  described  as  extreme  Home  Rul- 
ers ;  they  did  not  approve  of  the  methods  of  the 
Parliamentary  Party,  but  were  not  revolution- 
ists. There  were  a  few  like  MacNeill,  Pearse, 
Macdonagh,  Plunkett  and  O'Rahilly,  who  be- 
longed to  no  especial  political  party ;  they  were 
Idealists.  The  remainder  of  the  Committee 
were  moderate  men,  inclined  to  follow  the  Par- 
liamentary Party. ' '  * 

Col.  Moore  says  in  his  letter  that  it  is  inter- 
esting to  note  how  some  of  the  Sinn  Feiners  and 
Idealists  gradually  became  extremists  and 
merged  with  the  Fenians.  The  process  of  evo- 
lution was  not  gradual,  but  rapid,  so  rapid  that 
it  is  more  than  doubtful  if  there  were  any  evolu- 
tion at  all.    It  is  infinitely  more  probable  that 

*  Col.  Moore,  Freeman's  Journal,  May  30th,  1916. 


SINN  FEIN  GEOWS  EICH         139 

whatever  there  was  of  evolution  in  their  politi- 
cal principles  had  already  been  accomplished 
when  Col.  Moore  met  them,  and  that  they  al- 
ready had  their  goal  in  view,  though  they  kept 
it  concealed  from  their  moderate  colleagues. 
For  of  the  five  Idealists  whom  he  names  four 
took  part  in  the  Eebellion :  Professor  MacNeill 
was  only  deterred  from  doing  so  by  the  arrest 
of  Casement  and  the  capture  of  the  And. 

Very  significant  of  the  real  nature  and  aims 
of  the  Volunteer  movement  is  the  effect  it  had 
upon  the  fortunes  of  Sinn  Fein.  As  we  have 
seen,  it  had  been  a  year  before  in  abject  poverty. 
It  had  never  been  well  off.  Mr.  O'Hegarty 
states  that  one  contested  election,  involving  an 
expenditure  of,  at  the  outside,  £1000,  had 
seriously  crippled  it.  But  now  it  bounded  into  af- 
fluence, and  the  money  came  from  the  Clan-na- 
Gael,  which  had  long  been  watching  its  develop- 
ments and  was  now  assured  that  it  was  on  the 
right  line.  Pearse,  who  was  one  of  the  original 
Committee,  had,  like  the  Countess  Markievics, 
one  foot  in  Connolly's  Labour  Movement  and 
the  other  in  Sinn  Fein,  and  Connolly  and  Lar- 
kin  were  favourably  known  to  the  extremists  of 
America  as  revolutionaries  of  the  most  ap- 
proved brand.  It  is  impossible  to  doubt  that  the 
true  motive  of  the  Irish  Volunteers  was  revolu- 


140  UNDEECUEEENTS 

tionary,  though  it  is  possible  that  the  revolu- 
tionary tendencies  were  further  quickened  by 
the  insistence  of  the  trans-Atlantic  paymaster. 
It  is  extremely  instructive  to  read  the  fuller- 
blooded  Sinn  Fein  journals  at  this  period.  Sinn 
Fein  itself,  Mr.  Arthur  Griffith's  organ,  remains 
more  or  less  intellectual  and  economic  in  its  out- 
look. Irish  Freedom,  the  channel  through 
which  Casement  addressed  the  public,  was  more 
outspoken.  Mr.  Daly  weekly  regaled  its  read- 
ers with  his  Fenian  reminiscences;  essays  on 
military  tactics  filled  columns.  But,  perhaps 
most  remarkable  of  all,  was  the  sudden  revival 
of  the  Wolfe  Tone  cult,  which  was  coincident 
with  the  formation  of  the  Volunteer  Force. 
When  we  remember  that  Wolfe  Tone's  two 
claims  to  his  country's  gratitude  were  that  he 
had  organised  a  rebellion  at  the  time  when  Ire- 
land had  her  own  Parliament,  and  had  called  in 
foreign  allies  to  aid  him  in  his  purpose  of  de- 
stroying Grattan's  Parliament  as  an  engine  of 
British  tyranny,  this  sudden  and  passionate  re- 
vival of  his  memory  is  not  a  little  suggestive — 
suggestive  not  only  of  the  aims  of  the  inner  cir- 
cle, but  of  the  means  by  which  they  were  to  be 
attained. 


CHAPTEE  X 

AKMS   AND    THE   MAN 

Grant  us  a  great  war  for  the  liberty  of  the  peoples, 

We  pray  thee,  O  Lord. 
For  arms  and  our  flag  raised  again  in  battle, 

We  pray  Thee,  O  Lord. 

With  a  litany,  from  which  the  above  is  an  ex- 
tract, did  Irish  Freedom  hail  the  opening  of 
1914,  the  year  of  Fate. 

It  is  curious  how  this  idea  of  war  runs  like 
a  scarlet  thread  through  all  the  articles  in  Irish 
Freedom  at  this  period ;  it  would  be  surprising, 
were  it  not  certain  that  Casements  was  the 
mind  which  inspired,  and  his  often  the  hand 
that  wrote  them.  The  world  was  not  thinking 
of  war.  Such  uneasiness  as  existed  when  the 
Kaiser  made  his  theatrical  demarche  at  Agadir 
had  faded  out  of  mind ;  the  war  in  the  Balkans, 
the  powder  magazine  of  Europe,  had  produced 
no  explosion.  Lord  Haldane  had  brought  back 
a  cheery  optimism  from  Berlin,  and  no  one 
knew  that  it  was  assumed;  at  the  very  moment 

141 


142  AEMS  AND  THE  MAN 

when  the  Sinn  Fein  paper  was  publishing  its 
grim  litany  the  British  Chancellor  was  assuring 
the  country  that  never  was  the  time  more  oppor- 
tune for  reducing  the  vote  for  armaments.  The 
Chanceries  of  Europe  might  be  vigilant,  but  the 
people  were  careless,  working  and  playing  as 
they  worked  and  played  in  Pompeii  the  day  be- 
fore the  dead  volcano  awoke  to  new  life.  The 
only  thought  of  war  in  England  was  when  men 
prayed  for  peace  in  their  time.  But  in  Ireland 
men  were  talking  war,  thinking  war,  praying  for 
war,  because  Casement  taught  them — and  Case- 
ment knew. 

Up  to  this  moment  he  had  played  his  part 
with  patience.  He  had,  indeed,  been  active 
when  Germany  made  her  tentative  move  in 
Morocco  in  1911.  His  visits  to  Ireland  then 
were  frequent,  his  confabulations  with  Kuno 
Meyer  constant.  Though  the  necessity  for  ac- 
tion then  had  passed  away,  his  time  had  not 
been  wasted,  for  he  had  made  friendships  and 
preparations  which  stood  him  in  good  stead 
two  years  later.  In  the  interval  he  had  acquired 
a  title  and  gained  a  reputation  which  helped  him 
nicely,  and  his  retirement  from  the  service  was 
fortunately  coincident  with  an  emergency  which 
would  demand  his  unfettered  services.  So  in 
1913  he  could  gather  together  all  the  strings, 


CASEMENT  AT  WORK  143 

and  play  his  secret  part  in  forming  the  Irish 
Volunteers,  not  merely  to  counteract  the  Ulster 
movement  or  to  win  Ireland's  freedom,  but  to 
assist  in  keeping  those  British  troops  at  home 
which  General  Bernhardi  regarded  as  of  such 
first-rate  importance. 

It  is  very  notable  how  Casement's  activities 
increased  as  the  months  went  on.  He  may  not 
have  known  that  in  August  of  1913  Germany 
had  actually  informed  Italy  of  her  intention  to 
make  war  on  Serbia,  and  had  only  held  her  hand 
when  Italy  declined  to  take  a  part  in  the  game. 
But  he  knew,  as  every  German  agent  knew,  that 
the  Day  was  near  at  hand,  and  that  this  time 
there  would  be  no  drawing  back. 

There  appeared  in  Irish  Freedom  for  March, 
1914,  an  article  which  can  with  the  utmost  cer- 
tainty be  ascribed  to  Casement.  It  is  signed 
"The  Poor  Old  Woman."  Now,  this  is  the 
English  translation  of  "Shan  Van  Vocht,"  the 
nom  de  plume  of  the  writer  of  the  article  in  the 
Irish  Review  quoted  in  the  previous  chapter. 
There  is,  moreover,  in  the  article  a  most  remark- 
able illustration  of  Great  Britain's  method  of 
dealing  with  her  subject  nationalities.  She  is 
compared  to  the  "Sipo  Matador,"  or  "murder- 
ing creeper"  of  Brazil.  If  we  remember  that 
Casement  was  "Shan  Van  Vocht,"  that  he  was 


144  AEMS  AND  THE  MAN 

Consul-General  in  Brazil  and  was  familiar  with 
its  forest  life  from  his  experiences  at  Putuma- 
yo,  we  may  adapt  the  words  of  Macaulay  when 
he  fixed  the  authorship  of  Junius 's  letters  on 
Sir  Philip  Francis,  and  say,  "Either  Casement 
or  the  Devil." 

The  article  commences  with  these  remarkable 
words : 

"In  these  opening  days  of  1914  I  bring,  with 
a  message  of  hope,  these  scattered  thoughts 
upon  the  British  Empire  and  its  approaching 
dissolution  to  lay  before  the  youth  of  Ireland. 
I  say  dissolution  advisedly.  .  .  .  Home  Eule 
will  not  save  it.  The  attempt  to  bribe  Ireland, 
and  the  greater  Ireland  beyond  the  seas  . . .  will 
not  suffice.    The  issue  lies  in  stronger  hands." 

He  then  draws  the  parallel  above  mentioned 
between  Britain  and  the  ' '  Sipo  Matador, ' '  and 
continues:  "A  brave  hand  may  yet  cut  the 
'Sipo  Matador,'  and  the  slayer  be  slain  before 
he  has  quite  stifled  his  victim."  Then  follows 
a  lurid  picture  of  the  complacent  security  of  the 
Empire  and  its  approaching  doom. 

"  'All's  well  with  God's  world' — and  poet 
and  plagiarist,  courtier  and  courtesan,  Kipling 
and  cant — these  now  dally  by  the  banks  of  the 
Thames  and  dine  off  the  peoples  of  the  earth, 
just  as  once  the  degenerate  populace  of  Impe- 


THE  ANGLO-SAXON  CRIME        145 

rial  Rome  fed  upon  the  peoples  of  the  pyramids. 
But  the  end  is  near  at  hand.  The  'Secret  of 
Empire '  is  no  longer  the  sole  possession  of 
England.  Other  people  are  learning  to  think 
imperially.  The  Goths  and  Visigoths  of  modem 
Europe  are  upon  the  horizon.  .  .  .  London,  like 
Rome,  will  have  strange  guests.  They  will  not 
pay  their  hotel  bills." 

And  finally  Casement  denounces  England's 
attempt  to  "bribe"  America  by  giving  Ireland 
Home  Rule : 

"Were  the  Anglo-Saxon  alliance  ever  con- 
summated it  would  he  the  biggest  crime  in  hu- 
man history.  .  .  .  The  emanations  of  Thames 
sewage  are  all  over  the  world,  and  the  sewers 
are  running  still.  The  penalty  for  the  pollution 
of  the  Thames  is  a  high  one,  but  the  prize  for 
the  pollution  of  the  Mississippi  is  higher  still. 
.  .  .  The  'Anglo-Saxon'  Alliance  means  a  com- 
pact to  ensure  slavery  and  to  beget  war.  .  .  . 
The  true  alliance  to  aim  at  for  all  who  love 
peace  is  the  friendly  union  of  Germany,  Amer- 
ica, and  Ireland.  These  are  the  true  United 
States  of  the  World.  Ireland,  the  link  between 
Germany  and  America,  must  be  freed  by  both. '  '* 

We  need  not  pause  to  consider  the  view  which 
Casement  takes   of  an  Anglo-Saxon  alliance, 

*  Irish  Freedom,  March,  1914.    The  italics  are  ours. 


146  AEMS  AND  THE  MAN 

though  Americans  may  be  astonished  to  learn  it 
only  needs  their  co-operation  with  the  people 
from  whom  they  sprang  to  rivet  the  chains  of 
slavery  upon  a  world  devastated  by  wanton 
war.  Nor  need  we  waste  time  over  American 
sensations  when  this  discovery  comes  to  their 
notice.  The  really  significant  point  is  that  Case- 
ment represents  Germany  as  the  only  humanis- 
ing factor  in  any  world-ruling  alliance.  And  in 
this  alliance  Ireland  is  to  be  a  partner.  This  is 
an  advance  on  the  position  of  a  neutralised 
State  assigned  to  her  in  the  Irish  Review  arti- 
cle. She  is  now  to  be  the  link  between  the  two 
World  States,  America  and  Germany;  they  three 
are  to  be  the  true  United  States  of  the  World. 

After  such  an  outpouring  can  it  be  doubted 
that  the  Irish  Volunteers  were  to  be  something 
more  than  a  Fenian  Brotherhood,  that  they  were 
to  be  the  pledge  of  Ireland's  fidelity  to  the  Kai- 
ser? Many  of  the  Volunteer  leaders  did  not 
know  it;  Professor  John  MacNeill,  Gaelic 
Leaguer  and  idealist,  did  not  realise  at  that  time 
that  he  was  not  an  apostle  but  a  dupe,  not  a 
leader  but  a  fraudulent  advertisement.  He 
realised  it  later,  but  he  was  then  too  enmeshed 
to  escape  from  the  net. 

This  scheme  was  planned  and  executed  by 
one  who  had  accepted  honours  and  was  at  that 


"ABM  QUICKLY' '  147 

moment  receiving  a  pension  from  the  British 
Government.  A  few  months  later  this  same 
man  wrote  in  Fianna  an  article  which  Irish 
Freedom  declared  was  delightful  and  indispens- 
able to  every  Irish  boy.  It  was  on  the  subject 
of  "Chivalry." 

Its  author  was  at  that  time,  July,  1914,  in 
America,  whither  he  had  been  sent  to  act  as 
liaison  officer  between  the  American  Irish  ex- 
tremists and  the  German  Government.  But  be- 
fore he  went  he  wrote,  or  inspired,  a  final  ap- 
peal to  the  Irish  people.  It  was  headed 
"Arm  Quickly."  A  few  extracts  will  show  its 
nature : 

"Again  the  events  of  this  past  few  months 
have  restored  Ireland  to  international  status. 
Since  the  mission  of  Wolfe  Tone  to  Paris 
Europe  has  forgotten  Ireland  and  has  never 
given  a  thbught  to  the  possible  importance  of 
Ireland  in  the  conflict  of  European  interests. . . . 
Ireland  is  again  coming  to  be  a  factor  in  the 
thoughts  and  plans  and  life  of  Europe.  .  .  .  For 
Ireland  the  tide  has  turned  and  is  running  with 
an  almost  fearful  swiftness. . . .  Stranger  events 
them  any  that  have  come  yet  may  come  very 
soon,  and  probably  will  come.  .  .  .  There  is  one 
urgent  duty  that  devolves  upon  every  Irishman 
at  this  moment,  more  urgent  than  any  other. 


148  AEMS  AND  THE  MAN 

.  .  .  That  duty  is  to  become  armed,  and  to  be- 
come armed  very  quickly. ' '  * 

If  Casement's  forecast  of  the  ending  of  the 
great  war  was  mistaken,  how  marvellously  pro- 
phetic was  he  of  its  coming!  Within  three 
months  the  Austrian  Archduke  died  in  Sera- 
jevo,  within  four  Germany  had  launched  her  ul- 
timatum. Even  in  minor  details  his  prophecies 
were  fulfilled.  Strange  visitors,  Goths  and 
Visigoths,  visited  London.  They  did  not  pay 
their  hotel  bills.  And  Casement  himself  was 
one  of  them. 

About  this  time  the  conspirators  began  to 
separate,  each  betaking  himself  to  his  appointed 
task.  The  preliminary  work  was  done.  Kuno 
Meyer  and  Casement  had  striven  to  block  that 
Anglo-Saxon  alliance  which  would  have  op- 
posed so  terrible  a  barrier  to  Teutonic  ambition, 
they  had  contrived  to  turn  the  eyes  of  Ireland 
to  Germany  as  her  liberator,  as  in  former  days 
they  had  turned  to  Spain  and  France.  And  this 
they  had  done,  not  only  to  secure  liberty  for  Ire- 
land, but  to  secure  the  Empire  of  the  World  for 
Germany.  Casement  probably  thought  prima- 
rily of  the  first  of  these  objects  as  Kuno  Meyer 
would  naturally  think  most  of  the  second,  and 
so  they  made  their  bargain.    Before  he  wrote 

*  Irish  Freedom,  May,  1914.    The  italics  are  ours. 


THE  HEEL  OF  ACHILLES         149 

"Ireland  and  the  Next  War"  or  "The  Else- 
where Empire, ' '  from  which  we  have  just  quot- 
ed, Casement  had  written  an  article,  "The 
Keeper  of  the  Seas,"  which  was  published  in 
August,  1911.  Its  general  tenor  is  the  same,  but 
there  are  a  few  sentences  which  deserve  quota- 
tion, as  refuting  once  and  for  all  the  theory  that 
the  Irish  Volunteers  were  formed  to  counter- 
balance the  Volunteers  of  Ulster,  or  that  the 
present  movement  is  due  to  dissatisfaction 
with  the  Home  Eule  Bill  or  discontent  at  its 
postponement.  The  article  also  affords  food  for 
thought  to  those  who  contemplate  measures 
tending  to  weaken  the  connection  between  Great 
Britain  and  Ireland.  Casement's  words  may 
yet  be  heard  on  many  platforms. 

"Without  Ireland  there  would  be  to-day  no 
British  Empire.  The  vital  importance  of  Ire- 
land to  England  is  understood  but  never  pro- 
claimed by  every  British  statesman  .  .  .  and 
the  vital  importance  of  Ireland  to  Europe  is  not, 
and  has  not  been,  understood  by  any  European 
statesman.  To  them  it  has  not  been  a  European 
island,  a  vital  and  necessary  element  of  Euro- 
pean development,  but  an  appanage  of  England, 
an  island  beyond  an  island.  Montesquieu  alone 
of  French  writers  grasped  the  importance  of 
Ireland  in  the  international  affairs  of  his  time ; 


150  AKMS  AND  THE  MAN 

and  he  blames  the  vacillation  of  Louis  XIV., 
who  failed  to  put  forth  his  strength  to  establish 
James  upon  the  throne  of  Ireland,  and  thus  by 
an  act  of  perpetual  separation  to  '  affaiblir  le 
voisin.'  Napoleon,  too  late  in  St.  Helena,  real- 
ised his  error:  'Had  I  gone  to  Ireland  instead 
of  Egypt,  the  Empire  of  England  was  at  an 
end. '  Perhaps  the  one  latter-day  European  who 
perceived  the  true  relation  of  Ireland  to  Eng- 
land was  Niebuhr.  'Should  England,'  he  said, 
'  not  change  her  conduct,  Ireland  may  still,  for  a 
long  period,  belong  to  her,  but  not  always ;  and 
the  loss  of  that  country  is  the  death-day,  not 
only  of  her  greatness,  but  of  her  very  existence.  ■ 
.  .  .  Detach  Ireland  from  the  map  of  the  British 
Empire  and  restore  it  to  the  map  of  Europe  and 
that  day  England  resumes  her  native  propor- 
tions and  Europe  assumes  its  rightful  stature 
in  the  Empire  of  the  World.  Ireland  can  only 
be  restored  to  the  current  of  European  life, 
from  which  she  has  for  so  long  been  purposely 
withheld,  by  the  act  of  Europe.  What  Napoleon 
perceived  too  late  may  yet  be  the  purpose  and 
achievement  of  a  Congress  of  Nations.  .  .  .  Ire- 
land's strategic  importance  is  a  factor  of  su- 
preme weight  to  Europe,  and  is  to-day  used  in 
the  scale  against  Europe.  .  .  .  The  arbitrium 
mundi,  claimed  and  most  certainly  exercised  by 


THE  CHAMPION  OF  EUBOPE      151 

England,  is  maintained  by  the  British  fleet ;  and 
until  that  power  is  effectively  challenged  and 
held  in  check,  it  is  idle  to  talk  of  European  influ- 
ence outside  of  certain  narrow  Continental  lim- 
its. The  power  of  the  British  Fleet  can  never 
be  permanently  restrained  until  Ireland  is  re- 
stored to  Europe." 

This  constant  reiteration  of  the  word 
"Europe"  is,  of  course,  the  merest  camou- 
flage, to  use  the  expression  of  the  day.  How 
could  "Europe"  resume  its  rightful  stature  in 
the  Empire  of  the  World?  Individual  nations 
have  held  their  place  in  world-empire,  but  never 
a  Continent.  If  Europe  had  felt  the  pressure  of 
Britain's  fleet  intolerable,  Europe  could  end  it. 
Against  the  fleets  of  United  Europe  that  of  Great 
Britain  would  be  powerless.  The  late  war 
taught  us  how  difficult,  even  with  vast  naval  su- 
premacy, and  in  alliance  with  France  and  Italy, 
the  problem  of  living  could  become.  For 
1 '  Europe ' '  then  we  must  read  some  other  name, 
and  that  Casement  and  Kuno  Meyer  supply  in 
their  concluding  sentence: 

"Germany  then  of  necessity  becomes  the 
champion  of  European  interests  as  opposed  to 
the  world-dominion  of  England." 

And  poor,  blind,  besotted  Europe  never  saw  it ! 

In  the  summer  of  1914,  then,  the  friends  sep- 


152  AEMS  AND  THE  MAN 

arated,  Kuno  Meyer  to  go  to  Germany,  Case- 
ment to  America.  But,  before  he  sailed,  he 
went  to  London — he  himself  told  the  story  in 
a  New  York  paper — where  he  made  final  ar- 
rangements with  a  small  band  of  Irish  friends, 
whom  he  had  gathered  together  in  May,  1914, 
to  purchase  arms  on  the  Continent  and  to  land 
them  in  Ireland.  He  does  not  say  what  these 
arrangements  were,  but  it  is  a  fact  that  about 
that  time  there  began  to  appear  in  the  Gaelic 
American,  an  extreme  Clan-na-Gael  paper,  a 
series  of  lengthy  articles  contributed  by  Lieut.- 
Col.  J.  T.  Warburton,  formerly  of  the  Eoyal 
Engineers,  who  referred  in  them  to  his  connec- 
tion with  Casement.  These  articles  were  calcu- 
lated to  give  great  comfort  and  satisfaction  to 
the  clients  of  the  Gaelic  American,  They  con- 
tained grossly  vulgar  references  to  the  Queen, 
violent  diatribes  against  Mr.  Eedmond,  and  the 
coarsest  abuse  of  the  service  to  which  Col.  War- 
burton  had  once  belonged.  British  soldiers,  said 
Col.  Warburton,  were  "  justly  described  by  the 
New  York  Volunteer  Committee  as  the  laugh- 
ing-stock of  soldiers  throughout  the  world." 
They  had  shown  cowardice  in  the  New  Zealand 
War,  where  he  himself  had  fought;  the  Boers 
had  "kicked  them  from  one  end  of  South  Africa 
to  another";  if  an   expedition  were   sent  to 


TOMMY  ATKINS,  COWAKD        153 

France  (this  in  August,  1914),  "I  expect  it  will 
soon  be  defeated  and  surrender. ' '  "  The  British 
Army,"  he  wrote,  "is  a  negligible  quantity,  be- 
cause it  contains  but  few  Irish  and  Scots."  He 
rejoiced  greatly  during  the  retreat  from  Mons 
— "The  British  have  bolted  and  have  been  driv- 
en like  sheep  before  the  Germans. "  Their 
flight  was  disgraceful  because  their  casualties 
had  not  been  heavy,  and  he  hints  not  obscurely 
that  officers  were  voluntarily  surrendering 
themselves.  The  English  had  no  military  ar- 
dour— "We  are  tremendously  martial  so  long 
as  there  is  no  fighting.' '  As  for  Kitchener's 
Army,  it  was  hopeless.  Public  houses  had  to  be 
closed  at  11  p.  m.  because  the  men  got  drunk,  and 
Kitchener  himself  did  not  know  what  to  do  with 
them.  And  in  the  Gaelic  American  of  August 
22nd  he  makes  this  impassioned  appeal : 

"Are  our  American  friends  prepared  to  send 
rifles  to  help  England  against  a  country  which 
has  never  harmed  her!    I  think  not." 

In  all  that  has  been  written  about  the  Great 
War  the  patriotic  efforts  of  this  fine  British  sol- 
dier, probably  drawing  a  pension,  have  received 
no  mention.  But  they  should  not  pass  unre- 
corded. 

Having  set  these  forces  at  work,  Casement 
went  to  America,  and  on  August  1st  he  was 


154  AEMS  AND  THE  MAN 

staying  in  Philadelphia  with  Mr.  Joseph  Mc- 
Garrity. The  nature  of  his  business  with  Mr. 
McGarrity  may  be  judged  from  a  telegram  sent 
by  the  German  Foreign  Office  to  Count  von 
Bernstorff,  the  German  Ambassador  at  Wash- 
ington, on  January  26th,  1916 : — 

"January  26,  for  Military  Attache.  You  can 
obtain  particulars  as  to  persons  suitable  for 
carrying  on  sabotage  in  the  United  States  and 
Canada  from  the  following  persons:  (1)  Jo- 
seph McGarrity,  Philadelphia,  Pa.;  (2)  John  P. 
Kealing,  Michigan  Avenue,  Chicago;  (3)  Jere- 
miah O'Leary,  16  Park  Eow,  New  York.  One 
and  two  are  absolutely  reliable,  but  not  always 
discreet.  These  persons  are  indicated  by  Sir 
Eoger  Casement.  In  the  United  States  sabotage 
can  be  carried  out  on  every  kind  of  factory  for 
supplying  munitions  of  war.  Eailway  embank- 
ments and  bridges  must  not  be  touched.  Em- 
bassy must  in  no  circumstances  be  compro- 
mised. Similar  precautions  must  be  taken  in 
regard  to  Irish  pro-German  propaganda. 
"Signed,  Eepresentative  of  General  Staff."  * 
It  is  melancholy  to  have  to  record  that  the 
discreet  Mr.  Jeremiah  O'Leary  was,  in  June, 
1918,  indicted,  together  with  John  Eyan,  an  at- 
torney in  Buffalo,  Lieut.-Commander  Wessels, 

*  Published  by  American  Government. 


ENGLAND  THE  ENEMY  155 

of  the  German  Navy,  and  Baroness  Maria  von 
Kretschmann,  a  relative  of  the  German  Em- 
press, for  acts  of  treason,  such  as  giving  mili- 
tary information,  destruction  of  piers,  docks 
and  troop  transports  with  bombs,  assisting 
Germany  in  landing  an  armed  expedition  in  Ire- 
land, fomenting  a  revolt  in  Ireland,  and  so  on. 

On  August  22nd  there  appeared  in  the  Gaelic 
American  the  first  of  a  series  of  six  articles  by 
Casement,  under  the  title  of  "Ireland,  Germany 
and  the  Freedom  of  the  Seas.,,  Part  I.,  he 
said,  was  written  in  1911,  and  the  other  five  at 
odd  moments  between  that  time  and  1913.  The 
first  of  the  series  was  written  before  the  Home 
Eule  Bill  was  drawn,  and  therefore  represented 
a  settled  policy  formulated  without  regard  to 
the  merits  or  demerits  of  that  measure,  while 
all  six  were  written  while  the  author  was  a  high 
official  in  the  service  of  Great  Britain,  accepting 
knighthood  with  fulsome  professions  of  grati- 
tude. In  them  Casement  elaborates  the  doc- 
trines already  described,  but  he  brings  them  up- 
to-date  with  a  few  sentences  which  may  be 
quoted : 

"England  fights  as  the  foe  of  Europe  and  the 
enemy  of  civilisation.  In  order  to  destroy  Ger- 
man shipping,  German  commerce,  German  in- 
dustry, she  has  deliberately  planned  the  con- 


156  ARMS  AND  THE  MAN 

spiracy  we  now  see  at  work.  The  war  of  1914 
is  England's  war.  .  .  .  The  crippling  of  the 
British  fleet  will  mean  a  joint  German-Irish  in- 
vasion of  Ireland." 

And  then  Casement  ceases  from  his  literary 
propaganda  with  the  remark :  ' '  The  rest  of  the 
writer's  work  must  be  essayed  not  with  the 
author's  pen,  but  with  the  rifle  of  the  Irish  Vol- 
unteer.' ' 

By  this  time  Sinn  Fein  had  completely  aban- 
doned any  pretence  of  moderation.  Professor 
MacNeill  was  writing  impassioned  appeals  to 
Mr.  Joseph  McGarrity  for  arms.  "We  entreat 
and  beseech  you  to  join  with  us,  making  this 
the  grand  effort  of  our  lives,  and  shrinking 
from  no  sacrifice  that  the  peril  and  the  hope  of 
so  great  a  crisis  may  demand. ' '  *  Mr.  Arthur 
Griffith,  who,  though  he  numbered  Sir  Roger 
Casement  among  the  contributors  to  his  paper 
Sinn  Fein,  had  managed  to  preserve  an  appear- 
ance of  decent  moderation  so  long  as  it  paid,  al- 
lowed his  real  self  to  appear  whenwarbroke  out. 

"Ireland  is  not  at  war  with  Germany.  She 
has  no  quarrel  with  any  Continental  power. 
.  .  .  England  is  at  war  with  Germany.  Ger- 
many is  nothing  to  us  in  herself,  but  she  is  not 
an  enemy. ' '  f 

*  Gaelic  American,  July  18th,  1914. 
t  Sirm  Fern,  August  8th,  1914. 


MR.  GRIFFITH  BACKS  GERMANY    157 

A  little  later  Mr.  Griffith  had  an  opportunity 
to  help  Germany  and  he  eagerly  seized  it.  Case- 
ment wrote  two  letters  to  Ireland  from  Amer- 
ica, one  of  which  was  stopped  by  the  British 
Censorship,  while  the  other  got  through.  In  it 
Casement  begged  Irishmen  to  stay  at  home,  and 
to  refuse  to  assist  England  in  her  dishonest  at- 
tack on  a  people  with  whom  Ireland  had  no 
ground  of  quarrel.  This  letter  was  published  in 
Sinn  Fein  at  great  length  and,  in  an  abbreviated 
form,  in  the  Irish  Independent,  and  had  an  im- 
mediate effect  in  stopping  recruiting.  In  order 
to  clinch  the  matter,  Casement,  to  quote  his  own 
words,  "  hoped  that  the  German  Government 
might  be  induced  to  make  clear  its  peaceful  in- 
tention towards  Ireland,  and  that  the  effect  of 
such  a  pronouncement  in  Ireland  itself  might  be 
powerful  enough  to  keep  Irishmen  from  volun- 
teering for  a  war  that  had  no  claim  upon  their 
patriotism  or  their  honour.  With  this  aim  chief- 
ly in  view  I  came  to  Germany  in  November, 
1914,  and  I  succeeded  in  my  purpose.  '  The  Ger- 
man Government  declared  openly  its  goodwill 
to  Ireland  and  in  convincing  terms.'  " 

Here  we  touch  an  extremely  important  point. 
During  the  latter  part  of  1918,  and  in  this  pres- 
ent year,  Sinn  Fein  has  discovered  that  it  had 
backed  the  wrong  horse  and  has  been  trying  to 


158  AEMS  AND  THE  MAN 

hedge.  Its  leaders,  except  the  impulsive  Coun- 
tess Markievics,  have  repeatedly  declared  that 
there  was  no  alliance  with  Germany.  They 
have  further  declared — Mr.  De  Valera  has  done 
so  repeatedly  in  America — that  they  never  re- 
ceived any  German  money.*  Both  these  state- 
ments are  absolute  and  deliberate  falsehoods, 
and  this  is  a  convenient  place  to  consider  them. 

And  first  as  to  the  alliance.  The  "convinc- 
ing terms"  in  which  Germany  expressed  her 
goodwill  to  Ireland  were  sent  to  America  by 
wireless  and  published  on  November  21st,  1914 : 

"Sir  Eoger  Casement  was  received  at  the 
Foreign  Office  and  pointed  out  statements  which 
have  appeared  in  Ireland  .  .  .  that  German 
victory  would  inflict  great  loss  on  the  Irish  peo- 
ple. In  reply  the  Acting  Secretary  of  State  of 
the  Foreign  Office,  by  order  of  the  Imperial 
Chancellor,  officially  declared  that  the  German 
Government  repudiated  the  evil  intentions  at- 
tributed to  it,  and  only  desires  the  welfare  of 
the  Irish  people  and  country.  Germany  would 
never  invade  Ireland  with  a  view  to  its  conquest 
or  the  overthrow  of  any  native  institutions  of 
that  country.    Should  fortune  ever  bring  Ger- 

*  See  Irish  Independent,  July  17th,  1919.  Mr.  De  Valera 's 
words  are,  (il  have  denied  time  and  again  that  our  organisa- 
tion has  received  a  mark  or  a  rouble,  and  call  on  those  who 
make  the  charges  to  substantiate  them." 


THE  COMPACT  WITH  THE  HUN  159 

man  troops  to  Ireland's  shores  they  would  land 
there,  not  as  an  army  of  invaders  to  pillage  and 
destroy,  bnt  as  forces  of  a  nation  inspired  by 
goodwill  towards  the  country  and  people  for 
whom  Germany  desires  only  national  prosper- 
ity and  freedom." 

The  view  taken  of  this  document  by  the 
American-Irish  is  evident  from  the  following 
resolution  adopted  by  the  New  York  Irish  Vol- 
unteer Fund  Committee: — 

1 '  No  honest  friend  of  the  Irish  people  would 
assail  a  man  who  secured  such  a  guarantee  from 
a  friendly  Power  as  Sir  Eoger  Casement  has 
secured  from  the  Government  of  the  German 
Empire,  a  guarantee  which  will  remove  any 
doubt  which  may  have  been  entertained  regard- 
ing German  goodwill  by  a  section  of  the  Irish 
people.' '  * 

But  Germany  did  not  give  this  friendly  guar- 
antee for  nothing.  The  contract  had  to  be  bi- 
lateral. The  inducement  held  out  by  Casement 
that  such  a  guarantee  would  keep  Irishmen  from 
enlisting  was  well  enough,  but  it  would  be  more 
to  the  purpose  were  Irishmen  to  exchange  that 
attitude  of  passive  neutrality  for  one  of  active 
co-operation.  Casement  readily  fell  in  with  the 
idea,  if  indeed  he  had  not  already  conceived  it. 
Very  probably  he  was  delighted  to  get  such 

*  Gaelic  American,  December  5th,  1914. 


160  AEMS  AND  THE  MAN 

easy  terms.  It  is  extremely  curious  to  observe 
how  his  intercourse  with  the  Germans  had 
caused  him  to  absorb  their  peculiar  mentality 
which  enables  them  to  ignore  any  point  of  view 
except  their  own,  and  to  invert  with  a  garb  of 
virtue  anything  that  makes  for  their  advantage. 
Some  eight  months  later,  August  7th,  1915, 
Casement  wrote  a  letter,  which  was  published 
in  the  Gaelic  American,  in  which  he  described 
his  experiences  among  the  Irish  prisoners.  He 
repudiated  as  a  "stupid  and  childish  lie"  Mr. 
Redmond's  assertion  that  he  had  been  mobbed 
by  the  soldiers  whom  he  had  endeavoured  to 
enlist  for  his  Irish  Brigade.  He  had,  he  said, 
walked  among  them  alone  and  unguarded.  It 
was  indeed  true  that  some  of  the  "silly  youths" 
had  declared  that  "they  were  Englishmen  and 
had  no  use  for  an  Irish  traitor."  But  he  goes 
on,  "I  paid  no  attention  to  these  valiant  sup- 
porters of  Mr.  Redmond.  .  .  .  Had  those 
friends  of  Mr.  Redmond  been  as  brave  in  body 
as  they  were  in  words,  I  might  have  had  to  use 
my  cane."  And  he  concludes  this  astonishing 
epistle :  ' '  All  the  Irish  prisoners  of  war  at  Lim- 
burg  are  not  renegades  and  corner  boys,  but 
then  all  of  them  are  not  followers  of  Mr.  Red- 
mond and  fighting  for  British  ideals  of  civilisa- 
tion, progress,  and  humanity." 


IN  THE  PEISON  CAMP  161 

It  must  have  been  a  shock  to  him  to  find  that 
out  of  two  thousand  five  hundred  men  only 
fifty-two  responded  to  his  seduction.  Having 
himself  found  it  so  easy  to  conspire  against  the 
country  whose  pay  and  rewards  he  was  taking, 
he  must  have  been  amazed  to  find  among  these 
poor  half-starved,  ill-used,  poorly  paid  "  Tom- 
mies' '  such  loyalty  to  the  King  to  whom  they 
had  sworn  fealty.  In  his  distress  he  resolved 
to  call  religion  to  his  aid.  He  sent  a  message 
to  his  friends  in  America  through  Count  Bern- 
storff,  the  German  Foreign  Office  acting  as  in- 
termediary, asking  them  to  send  a  priest  to  help 
him,  and  in  response  they  despatched  a  Eoman 
Catholic  clergyman,  whose  efforts  were  no  more 
successful.* 

Such  was  the  bargain,  made  and  kept  by  both 
the  contracting  parties.  If  ever  in  this  world 
there  was  an  alliance,  that  between  Sinn  Fein 
and  Germany  was  one. 

Now  as  to  the  question  of  the  receipt  of  Ger- 
man money  by  Sinn  Fein.  As  might  be  ex- 
pected, these  financial  transactions  were  car- 
ried out  with  every  precaution  to  obey  the  in- 
structions of  the  German  Foreign  Office  that 

*  Trial  of  Joseph  Dowling,  Times,  July  9th,  1918.    See  also 
Report  of  Casement's  trial. 


162  AKMS  AND  THE  MAN 

the  Embassy  at  Washington  was  not  to  be  com- 
promised. Eevelations  made  at  a  later  date 
by  the  American  Government  show  that  moneys 
paid  from  that  source  flowed  through  most  tor- 
tuous channels,  so  that,  like  the  victims  of  the 
U-boats,  it  should  " leave  no  trace.' '  But  in 
spite  of  these  precautions  there  is  full  knowl- 
edge of  financial  transactions  between  Count 
Bernstorff  and  the  American  directors  of  the 
Irish  movement.  The  terms  of  the  treaty  made 
by  Casement  were  printed  in  Berlin  in  a  leaflet 
which  was  circulated  in  Ireland  as  coming  from 
the  German  Foreign  Office.  But  this  is  not  all. 
We  have  Count  Bernstorff's  own  words  to  prove 
the  allegations. 

After  the  failure  of  the  Dublin  rebellion  Sinn 
Fein  found  itself  in  low  water.  Its  desire  for 
revolution  was  undiminished,  but  its  purse  was 
empty.  In  these  circumstances  it  appealed  to 
Count  Bernstorff  for  help,  in  itself  an  indication 
that  it  had  made  similar  appeals  before.  On 
June  17th,  1916,  the  Foreign  Office  informed 
Count  Bernstorff  that  help  would  be  forthcom- 
ing if  Sinn  Fein  would  indicate  what  was  want- 
ed. In  July  Count  Bernstorff  replied  to  Berlin. 
Things,  he  said,  were  moving  again  in  Ireland 
and  the  rebels  were  reorganising  their  forces. 


THE  GEEMAN  PAYMASTER       163 

They  were,  he  added,  in  need  of  money,  but  he 
had  put  that  matter  right. 

This  revelation  is  doubly  interesting,  first  be- 
cause it  proves  beyond  contradiction  that  Sinn 
Fein  did  receive  German  money;  next  because 
it  destroys  the  fiction,  concocted  by  some  recent 
apologists  of  Sinn  Fein,  that  the  rebellion  was 
not  its  work,  but  that  of  the  party  of  revolu- 
tionary labour. 

At  this  point  we  leave  Casement  and  his  in- 
trigues in  Germany  for  the  moment,  and  re- 
turn to  Ireland. 


CHAPTER  XI 

PKIVY  CONSPIRACY   AND  REBELLION 

The  quarrel  between  the  Parliamentarians  and 
Sinn  Fein,  which  had  long  been  smouldering, 
began  to  glow  when  the  Irish  Volunteers  were 
called  into  existence,  and  burst  into  flame  with 
the  outbreak  of  war.  Whatever  were  the  real 
feelings  of  Mr.  Redmond  as  Sinn  Fein  snapped 
at  his  heels,  he  concealed  them  under  a  contemp- 
tuous indifference.  The  Sinn  Feiners  were 
merely  a  negligible  handful  of  cranks,  who,  like 
Benedick,  would  still  be  talking  though  no  one 
heeded  them.  But  when  the  cranks  proceeded 
to  raise  a  Volunteer  Force,  matters  became 
more  serious.  From  the  merely  party  point  of 
view  the  new  departure  was  threatening.  Even 
though  the  Force  might  be  for  display  rather 
than  for  use,  it  would  popularise  Sinn  Fein  and 
by  its  novelty  detach  many  of  his  more  ardent 
supporters.  And  it  was  not  certain  that  it  would 
be  confined  entirely  to  ceremonial  parades  and 
innocuous  display.  The  leader  of  the  Irish 
Party  was  not  ignorant  of  the  existence  of  a 

164 


MR.  REDMOND'S  DILEMMA        165 

section  in  America  which  regarded  his  policy 
with  disfavour,  because  of  its  moderation,  and 
which  might,  as  it  did,  see  in  the  Volunteers  an 
engine  for  active  mischief. 

These  early  doubts  developed  into  active  ap- 
prehension with  the  appearance  of  Casements 
articles  in  Irish  Freedom,  and  the  growing 
activity  of  the  American-Irish  controlled  by 
Devoy,  Judge  Cohalan,  and  Jeremiah  O'Leary. 
Mr.  Redmond's  heart  must  have  been  heavy  as 
he  marked  the  rapid  growth  of  the  Volunteers 
and  of  the  revolutionary  truculence  of  its  lead- 
ers. Revolution  was  fatal  to  his  policy  and  re- 
pugnant to  his  mind.  In  spite  of  certain  ambi- 
guities of  speech,  of  which  his  opponents  were 
not  slow  to  avail  themselves,  Mr.  Redmond 
proved,  in  the  supreme  crisis  of  his  life,  that  he 
was  true  to  the  British  connection.  Had  he,  in 
August,  1914,  but  proclaimed  Irish  neutrality, 
he  would  probably  have  been  the  most  popular 
and,  perhaps,  powerful  Irish  leader  of  a  century. 
Instead  of  that  he  embraced  the  cause  of  the  Al- 
lies, risked  all,  and  lost.  To  him,  therefore,  the 
rising  tide  of  revolution  brought  the  most  acute 
embarrassment.  He  dare  not  oppose  the  move- 
ment— to  do  that  was  to  court  disaster — and  so 
he  resolved  to  control  it.  With  this  view  he 
demanded  the   right  to  nominate   twenty-five 


166      CONSPIRACY  AND  REBELLION 

members  to  the  Committee.  This  transferred 
the  embarrassment  to  the  Sinn  Feiners.  They 
dared  not  refuse,  for  Mr.  Redmond's  was  still 
a  name  to  conjure  with,  so  with  some  bluster 
and  many  wry  faces  they  gave  way.  It  was  then 
that  the  smouldering  fires  began  to  glow. 

They  broke  into  flame  when  he  endeavoured 
to  raise  battalions  for  the  service  of  Great 
Britain.  Unionists  of  high  position  and  strong 
views  joined  the  Volunteers  when  Mr.  Redmond 
proposed  to  unite  them  with  the  men  of  Ulster 
in  an  army  of  defence.  The  Ulster  Volunteers 
stood  out  and  prepared  to  form  an  Expedition- 
ary Division.  Mr.  Redmond  followed  their  ex- 
ample, and  then  Sinn  Fein  finally  broke  away. 
A  manifesto  was  drawn  up  on  September  9th 
and  published  on  the  25th  in  which  Mr.  Red- 
mond was  excommunicated  and  his  nominees 
removed  from  the  Committee.  The  signatories 
to  this  document  were  Professor  MacNeill,  The 
O'Rahilly,  Thomas  Macdonough,  Joseph  Plun- 
kett,  P.  H.  Pearse,  Buhner  Hobson,  Eamonn 
Ceaunt,  Sean  MacDearmada,  and  Mellowes. 
Following  the  issue  of  the  manifesto,  the  Vol- 
unteer Force  split  into  two  factions,  the  larger 
adhering  to  Mr.  Redmond  under  the  name  of  the 
National  Volunteers,  while  the  smaller  body 
kept  the  old  name.  Henceforth  it  is  with  the  lat- 


LORD  KITCHENER'S  DECISION   167 

ter  body  that  we  are  concerned,  for  the  National 
Volunteers  gradually  ceased  to  play  any  active 
part  in  Irish  politics. 

It  is  possible  that  at  this  time  there  was,  even 
among  the  Irish  Volunteers  who  had  cast  out 
Mr.  Redmond,  a  moderate  section.  Giving  evi- 
dence before  the  Rebellion  Commission,  Col. 
Moore,  who  adhered  to  Mr.  Redmond,  stated 
that  the  leaders  of  the  Volunteers — before  they 
divided — and  among  them  men  who  afterwards 
fought  in  the  Dublin  rising,  were  willing  to  join 
in  the  defence  of  the  Empire,  but  were  refused. 
What  happened  was  this :  Soon  after  war  broke 
out  a  staff  officer  in  Ireland  proposed  that  mili- 
tary training  should  be  given  to  all  the  Volun- 
teers in  Ireland;  that  the  military  should  be 
withdrawn  and  the  barracks,  thus  vacated, 
should  be  filled  by  the  Volunteers.  In  this  way 
he  calculated  20,000  men  could  be  trained  for 
two  months,  sent  into  camps  and  their  places 
taken  by  another  batch  of  recruits.  Many  of 
the  Volunteer  leaders  agreed,  but  Lord  Kitchen- 
er rejected  the  proposal.  Why  he  did  so  is  un- 
certain. He  may  have  thought  that  the  risk  of 
leaving  Ireland  denuded  of  troops,  sorely  as  he 
needed  them  elsewhere,  was  too  great,  as  indeed 
well  he  might  after  reading  the  articles  in  Irish 
Freedom,  and  other  organs  of  Sinn  Fein.    He 


168    CONSPIEACY  AND  KEBELLION 

may  even  have  feared — and  of  course  he  had  se- 
cret information  as  to  affairs  in  Ireland — that 
the  acquiescence  of  some  of  the  Volunteer  lead- 
ers was  only  a  pretence  to  get  the  British  troops 
out  of  Ireland,  and  indeed,  some  suggestive  ref- 
erences to  the  proposal  had  appeared  in  the 
Irish  Volunteer.  He  probably  knew,  as  the  Eng- 
lish Labour  men  who  went  over  to  help  Connol- 
ly with  funds  had  soon  discovered,  that  the  Dub- 
lin strike  of  the  preceding  year  was  a  rehearsal 
of  revolution  rather  than  a  strike  against  indus- 
trial conditions,  and  he  certainly  must  have  had 
knowledge  of  Fenian  activities  in  America.  At 
all  events  he  turned  the  proposal  down,  and 
quite  probably  he  was  justified  by  the  rupture 
which  within  a  few  weeks  took  place  in  the  Vol- 
unteer Movement. 

It  would  be  unprofitable,  even  were  it  possi- 
ble, to  follow  in  detail  the  course  of  events  dur- 
ing the  next  few  months,  during  which  the  rift 
in  the  Volunteers  widened  into  a  yawning  chasm, 
and  Mr.  Eedmond  came  to  be  classed  with 
O'Connell  as  a  traitor  to  Ireland.  In  January, 
1915,  things  had  gone  so  far  that  the  Gaelic 
American  published  a  dreadful  letter,  purport- 
ing to  be  written  in  hell  by  Lord  Castlereagh, 
the  statesman  who  carried  through  the  Act  of 
Union,  James  Carey,  the  author  of  the  Phoenix 
Park  murders  and  the  informer  on  whose  evi- 


< ' JOHN  REDMOND,  TRAITOR"     169 

dence  the  murderers  were  hanged,  and  Richard 
Pigott,  the  author  of  the  forged  letters  in  the 
Parnell  Commission.  They  praise  Redmond 
highly  for  his  policy,  and  say  "his  Satanic  Maj- 
esty has  prepared  a  very  warm  reception  for 
him  and  we  hope  Mr.  Redmond  will  not  keep 
him  waiting  long.  .  .  .  Our  membership  (i.e., 
the  membership  of  traitors  to  Ireland)  has 
greatly  increased  in  the  last  few  months  through 
the  arrival  here  of  almost  all  the  brave  West 
Britons  Mr.  Redmond  has  induced  to  go  to  the 
front  to  defend  our  glorious  flag." 

Though  in  Ireland  party  passion  did  not 
reach  such  heights  of  expression,  it  was  rising 
every  day,  fanned  by  the  news  of  the  Irish-Ger- 
man alliance,  which  arrived  through  wireless 
stations,  of  which,  as  Count  Bernstorfr*  informed 
Berlin,  there  were  many  in  Ireland.*  The  terms 
of  the  German  statement  were  printed  in  Berlin 
in  leaflet  form  and  were  circulated  in  the  coun- 
try. Large  numbers  of  this  leaflet,  as  well  as 
of  Casement's  articles  on  " Ireland,  Germany 
and  the  Freedom  of  the  Seas,"  were  found,  to- 
gether with  ammunition  and  explosives,  in  the 
house  of  a  man  called  De  Lacy  at  Enniscorthy, 
County  Wexford,  in  February.f  Proclamations 

*  Government  statement,  May  25th,  1918. 

f  Enniscorthy  was  one  of  the  centres  of  rebellion  in  1916. 
De  Lacy  escaped  to  America,  where  he  intrigued  with  German 
agents  and  was  given  two  years'  imprisonment. 


170    CONSPIRACY  AND  REBELLION 

were  posted  up  in  many  parts  of  the  county  to 
the  following  effect: 

"People  of  Wexford. 

"Take  no  notice  of  the  police  order  to  destroy 
your  property  and  leave  your  homes  if  a  Ger- 
man Army  lands  in  Ireland.  When  the  Ger- 
mans come  they  will  come  as  friends  and  put  an 
end  to  English  rule  in  Ireland.  Therefore,  stay 
in  your  homes,  and  assist  as  far  as  possible  the 
German  troops.  Any  stores,  hay,  corn,  or  for- 
age taken  by  the  Germans  will  be  paid  for  by 
them. ' ' 

German  agents  and  spies  were  ubiquitous  and 
busy  at  this  time.  Baron  Von  Horst  was  ar- 
rested for  distributing  anti-recruiting  and  se- 
ditious literature ;  Lody,  a  greater  than  he,  was 
captured  at  Killarney,  where,  it  was  stated  be- 
fore the  Rebellion  Commission,  one  of  the  hotel 
waiters  was  also  a  German  spy.  Up  and  down 
the  country  agents  were  at  work,  predicting 
British  defeat  and  extolling  the  single-minded 
generosity  of  the  Huns.  Stories  were  current  in 
the  west  of  Ireland  which  illustrate  the  effect 
of  these  efforts,  among  them  the  following, 
which  is  within  the  knowledge  of  the  writer.  A 
vessel,  it  was  said,  had  been  stopped  by  a  U-boat 
off  the  south-west  coast.  When  the  German  com- 
mander learned  that  she  was  carrying  grain  to  an 


WEAVING  THE  WEB  171 

Irish  port,  lie  bade  her  proceed.  "I  will  never/ ' 
he  handsomely  declared,  "interfere  with  the 
food  of  the  priests  and  good  people  of  Ireland." 
The  disposition  of  the  conspirators  in  1915 
was  as  follows :  In  Germany  Casement  was  mak- 
ing desperate  efforts  to  make  good  his  pledge  to 
the  German  Government;  in  America  Kuno 
Meyer  was  stumping  the  country,  ostensibly  lec- 
turing on  the  Gaelic  language,  but  really  carry- 
ing on  intrigues  the  nature  of  which  may  be  easi- 
ly defined,  while  his  friends  and  partners  the 
Irish- American  leaders  directed  operations,  and 
Count  Bernstorff  obligingly  violated  the  canons 
of  diplomatic  usage  by  allowing  them  to  use 
his  post-bag,  and  acted  as  paymaster  for  these 
so-called  American  citizens  and  their  needy 
parasites.  There  was  even  a  secret  code,  the 
"Cypher  Devoy,"  which  was  specially  used  for 
communications  between  the  rebels  and  their 
German  allies.*  In  Ireland  the  Sinn  Fein 
leaders  denounced  the  Constitutional  National- 
ists, extolled  Germany,  vilified  every  Irishman 
who  donned  the  British  uniform,  with  special 
terms  of  reproach  for  any  who,  like  Corporal 
O'Leary,  might  have  earned  particular  glory, 
and  worked  feverishly  on  the  task  of  drilling 

*  Von  Igel  papers.     Published  by  the  American  Committee 
of  Public  Safety,  September  23rd,   1917. 


172    CONSPIEACY  AND  KEBELLION 

and  equipping  the  Volunteers.  They  had  their 
reward  in  later  days,  when  Professor  Edouard 
Meyer  of  the  University  of  Berlin  declared  that 
"during  the  war  Ireland  had  shown  herself 
Germany's  true  ally,  not  only  with  arms  in  her 
hands,  but  by  her  passive  resistance.' ' 

The  sinking  of  the  Lusitania,  though  it  was 
hailed  with  delight  by  the  American  conspira- 
tors, caused  them  much  embarrassment.  Prior 
to  that  event,  though  they  had  grumbled  openly 
at  what  they  regarded  as  President  Wilson's 
one-sided  neutrality,  they  clung  to  the  belief 
that  a  large  section  of  the  American  people  were 
friendly  to  Germany,  or  at  least  strictly  impar- 
tial in  their  sentiments.  After  the  atrocity  that 
fond  hope  vanished.  The  German  Empire  sank 
with  the  great  ship :  the  same  torpedo  destroyed 
both.  All  semblance  of  sympathy  for  the  Cen- 
tral Empires  disappeared,  and  it  needed  the 
firm  hand  of  the  President  to  hold  his  people 
back.  America  did  not  enter  the  war  until  two 
years  later,  it  is  true,  but  the  altered  sentiments 
of  the  nation  must  have  been  disconcerting  to 
Devoy  and  his  colleagues,  and  may  possibly 
have  had  some  effect  in  precipitating  events  in 
Ireland.  The  change  in  American  feeling  and 
its  influence  on  the  Sinn  Fein  leaders  may  be 
traced  in  the  editorials  of  the  Gaelic  American, 


LESSONS  IN  WAE  173 

in  the  added  virulence  of  their  attacks  on  the 
American  papers,  and  the  steadily  growing  list 
of  journals  that  came  under  their  ban. 

In  Ireland  things  began  to  move  swiftly  as 
the  year  went  on.  Organisers  formed  new  de- 
tachments of  Volunteers  throughout  the  south- 
ern provinces  and  the  numbers  were  steadily 
swelled  by  desertions  fromjthe  National  Volun- 
teers, Arms  were  smuggled  in,  including  some 
machine  guns;  weapons  were  stolen  from  the 
National  Volunteers,  and  were  obtained  by 
thefts  or  purchase  from  soldiers  home  on  leave ; 
explosives  were  concealed  in  convenient  places 
and  bombs  were  manufactured.  Old  soldiers 
acted  as  instructors,  and  the  Sinn  Fein  papers 
devoted  much  of  their  space  to  articles  on  mili- 
tary tactics,  such  as  street  fighting,  defence  or 
destruction  of  roads  and  bridges,  rearguard  ac- 
tions, and  such  modifications  of  established 
rules  as  were  necessitated  by  the  nature  of  the 
country.  Germany  helped  with  very  full  in- 
structions in  staff  work,  and  with  admirable 
maps  of  Dublin  and  the  country. 

The  most  important  event  of  this  period, 
however,  was  the  alliance  that  was  formed  be- 
tween the  Irish  Volunteers  and  the  Citizen 
Army,  important  less  from  the  strictly  military 
point  of  view  than  from  its  ultimate  political 


174    CONSPIEACY  AND  EEBELLION 

results.  As  a  fighting  force  the  Citizen  Army 
was  almost  negligible ;  it  added  some  hundreds 
of  desperate  men,  mainly  concentrated  in  Dub- 
lin, of  the  Irish  Volunteers,  and  indeed  it  was  the 
Citizen  Army  which  was  most  active  in  the  Dub- 
lin rebellion.  But  the  junction  between  the  forces 
had  enormous  political  consequences.  It 
brought  together  the  two  revolutionary  cur- 
rents, thenceforth  to  flow  in  a  single  stream. 
Except  for  a  few  idealists  like  Pearse,  Sinn 
Fein  had  scant  sympathy  with  the  economic 
aims  of  Connolly  and  Larkin — Arthur  Griffith, 
indeed,  was  strongly  opposed  to  the  great  Dub- 
lin strike.  Larkin  and  Connolly,  on  their  side, 
would  regard  the  responsible  Sinn  Feiners,  such 
as  Count  Plunkett,  Professor  MacNeill,  Mr. 
Sweetman,  and  The  O'Rahilly,  as  natural  ene- 
mies. They  found  a  link  of  union  in  hatred  of 
Great  Britain,  and  thenceforward  the  national 
movement  changed  its  character.  As  always 
happens  in  revolutions,  so  soon  as  the  intellec- 
tuals call  the  sans  culottes  to  their  aid,  they  be- 
come merged  in  the  proletarian  movement.  Up 
to  1915  Great  Britain  had  to  deal  with  a  politi- 
cal and  intellectual  movement;  since  that  time, 
and  now,  she  is  faced  by  a  revolutionary  force 
no  longer  wholly  political,  but  infused  and  large- 
ly inspired  by  anarchical  doctrines.    Thus  Sinn 


GERMANY  DEMANDS  THE  GOODS  175 

Fein  saddled  itself  with  an  incubus,  fatal  to  its 
original  principles,  and  destined  to  be  embar- 
rassing in  the  last  degree.  The  day  will  surely 
come  when,  like  Mr.  Bumble,  it  will  bitterly  la- 
ment that  it  sold  its  liberty  so  cheap. 

"With  the  opening  of  1916  the  Irish  leaders 
determined  that  the  "Day"  had  arrived.  Those 
in  America  probably  found  their  position  get- 
ting more  irksome.  An  American  writer  has 
said:  "If  Americans  had  small  patience  with 
Ulster  in  1914,  they  had  still  less  with  Sinn  Fein 
in  1916. ' '  *  Casement,  in  Berlin,  was  being 
pressed  by  Germany  to  "deliver  the  goods." 
His  failure  to  seduce  the  Irish  soldiers  had 
somewhat  shaken  Teutonic  faith  in  his  reliabil- 
ity, and  he  had  to  do  something  to  redeem  his 
promises.  In  Ireland  the  conspirators  had  pre- 
pared elaborate  and,  on  paper,  extremely  effec- 
tive plans  of  campaign ;  they  probably  calculated 
too  optimistically  the  amount  of  the  aid  that  Ger- 
many would  lend ;  moreover,  though  Mr.  Birrell 
refused  to  be  alarmed,  their  spies  in  the  Govern- 
ment Departments  reported  that  other  officials 
were  awakening  to  a  sense  of  realities ;  and  so 
they  resolved  that  the  time  had  come  to  strike. 

During  March,  1916,  messages  were  going 
back  and  forward  between  Germany  and  Amer- 
ica, as  to  the  transmission  of  arms  to  Tralee 

*  Waldo  G.  Lelaud,  Quarterly  'Review,  July,  1918. 


176    CONSPIRACY  AND  REBELLION 

Bay,  the  possibility  of  U-boats  entering  the  Lif- 
f ey,  and  arranging  a  code  of  signals  for  use  dur- 
ing these  operations.  The  Irish  Volunteers  car- 
ried ont  a  few  dress  rehearsals  in  Dublin,  includ- 
ing a  sham  attack  on  the  Castle,  and  Professor 
MaeNeill,  as  Chief  of  Staff,  ordered  general 
marches  and  parades  of  the  Volunteers  for 
Easter  Sunday,  April  23rd. 

On  April  18th,  the  following  despatch  was 
sent  to  Count  BernstorfT,  marked ' '  very  secret ' ' : 

"  Judge  Cohalan  requests  the  transmission  of 
the  following  remarks :  The  revolution  in  Ire- 
land can  only  be  successful  with  the  support  of 
Germany;  otherwise  England  will  be  able  to 
suppress  it,  even  though  it  be  only  after  a  hard 
struggle.  Therefore  help  is  necessary.  This 
should  consist  principally  of  aerial  attacks  on 
England  and  a  diversion  of  the  fleet  simultane- 
ously with  the  Irish  revolution.  Then  if  possi- 
ble a  landing  of  arms  and  ammunition  in  Ire- 
land and  possibly  some  officers  from  Zeppelins. 
This  would  enable  the  Irish  ports  to  be  closed 
against  England  and  the  cutting  of  the  food 
supply  for  England.  The  services  of  the  revo- 
lution, therefore,  may  decide  the  war."  * 

The  rest  is  known.    On  April  21st,  the  And 

*  Found  by  American  Secret  Service  agents  in  the  office  of 
Von  Igel,  a  German  agent.  New  York  World,  Sept.  23rd,  1917. 


CASEMENT  LANDS  177 

was  sighted  by  the  Bluebell.  She  professed  to 
be  a  Norwegian  ship,  bound  from  Bergen  to 
Genoa.  Dissatisfied  and  suspicious,  the  com- 
mander of  the  Bluebell  ordered  her  to  accom- 
pany him  to  Queenstown.  On  the  morning  of 
the  following  day  the  Aud  hoisted  German  col- 
ours, the  crew  took  to  the  boats  and  the  ves- 
sel soon  afterwards  sank.  She  was  manned  by 
German  officers  and  sailors,  and  carried  a  large 
cargo  of  arms  and  ammunition.  On  the  21st, 
too,  Casement,  with  two  companions,  landed 
from  a  German  submarine  at  Curraghgane,  in 
Tralee  Bay,  and  was  arrested  within  a  few 
hours.  The  news  reached  Professor  MacNeill 
on  Saturday,  and  he  issued  orders  cancelling  the 
marches  and  parades  on  the  following  day.  He 
was  willing  to  wound,  but,  in  face  of  Casement's 
arrest  and  the  failure  of  the  German  munitions 
to  reach  Ireland,  he  was  too  prudent  to  strike. 
Others  did  strike,  but  the  plans  had  gone  awry, 
and  the  rebellion  was  crushed.  But  for  an  ac- 
cident to  a  motor-car,  it  would  not  have  been 
crushed  in  a  week,  on  such  small  chances  do 
great  matters  hinge.*  Had  the  car  met  Case- 
ment, Professor  MacNeill  would  have  been  less 
prudent,  his  volunteers  would  have  gone  out  for 
their  manoeuvres,  provisioned  for  a  few  days' 

*  Irish  Volunteer,  April  22nd,  1916. 


178    CONSPIRACY  AND  REBELLION 

bivouac.  As  it  was,  the  revolution  was  mainly 
confined  to  Dublin,  though  there  was  fighting 
also  in  Galway,  Wexford,  and  County  Dublin, 
where  two  officers  and  eight  men  of  the  Royal 
Irish  Constabulary  were  killed  and  fourteen 
wounded,  while  in  Tralee  the  Volunteers  were 
mobilised.  The  sinking  of  the  And  and  the  ar- 
rest of  Casement  did  not  prevent  a  calamity,  but 
they  averted  a  very  grave  danger. 

So  Casement  passes  from  the  stage,  the  most 
ignoble  of  all  the  leading  players  in  the  drama. 

The  loss  of  life — of  material  damage  to  Dub- 
lin we  say  nothing — was  not  inconsiderable.  Of 
those  who  fought  for  the  Crown,  19  officers  and 
19  of  other  ranks  were  killed,  and  46  officers 
and  326  other  ranks  were  wounded.  From  the 
hospitals  180  civilians  were  reported  killed  and 
614  wounded,  and  this  certainly  does  not  ex- 
haust the  list  of  casualties. 

For  a  country  which  is  uniformly  described 
in  Ireland  as  revelling  in  tyranny  the  retribu- 
tion exacted  by  Great  Britain  was  not  excessive. 
Some  three  thousand  rebels  were  arrested,  two 
thousand  of  whom  were  deported,  the  great  ma- 
jority being  released  in  a  few  months.  Of  the 
leaders,  fifteen  were  executed.  Others,  sen- 
tenced to  death,  had  their  sentences  commuted 
to  penal  servitude  for  life,  but  were  all  released 
in  a  little  more  than  a  year.    Among  them  was 


GENEEAL  MAXWELL  179 

De  Valera,  who  commanded  one  of  the  rebel  de- 
tachments in  Dublin,  and  who  was  among  the 
last  to  surrender.  Thus,  by  midsummer  1917 
not  a  single  rebel  remained  in  prison  for  of- 
fences connected  with  the  rising,  and  only  fif- 
teen of  those  who  had  hatched  the  plot  which 
caused  such  ruin  and  suffering  had  paid  the  ex- 
treme penalty. 

Nevertheless  the  epithets  applied  to  General 
Maxwell,  the  Commander-in-Chief,  would  have 
been  more  appropriate,  if  indeed  not  excessive, 
if  applied  to  Wallenstein  or  Alva.  The  Bishop 
of  Limerick,  being  restrained  by  his  episcopal 
position,  contented  himself  with  writing  to  the 
Guardians  of  the  Tipperary  Union  of  "that 
brute  Maxwell,  who  in  my  opinion  is  only  one 
degree  less  objectionable  than  the  Government 
that  screens  behind  him. ' '  What  he  might  have 
said  had  he  been  a  mere  layman  is  interesting 
as  a  speculation,  but  must  be  neglected  in  view 
of  the  succeeding  portion  of  the  letter,  which  is 
not  only  interesting,  but  important,  since  it  gave 
the  cue  for  the  future  Irish  policy : 

"Ireland  is  not  dead  yet.  While  her  young 
men  are  not  afraid  to  die  for  her  in  open  fight; 
and  when  defeated  stand  proudly  with  their 
backs  to  the  wall  as  targets  for  English  bullets, 
we  need  not  despair  of  the  old  land. ' '  * 

*  Letter  to  Tipperary  Board  of  Guardians,  June,  1916. 


180    CONSPIEACY  AND  EEBELLION 

This  pronouncement  had  all  the  more  effect 
because  the  Bishop  had  generally  been  regarded 
as  a  moderate,  exercising  a  conservative  influ- 
ence upon  Nationalist  thought.  Its  immediate 
result  was  to  unmuzzle  the  younger  and  more 
hot-blooded  clergy  and  to  revive  the  chastened 
passion  of  the  Eepublicans ;  its  ultimate  effects 
were  far-reaching,  for  it  destroyed  the  hopes  of 
amicable  settlement  which  at  that  time  had  be- 
gun to  take  visible  shape. 

The  rebellion  had  shocked  the  more  sober 
elements  of  society.  It  had  brought  them  face 
to  face  with  the  realities  of  Civil  War.  The 
gaunt  ruins  of  Sackville  Street  were  so  many 
signposts  pointing  towards  conciliation.  The 
Government  seized  the  opportunity  to  reopen 
the  negotiations  which  had  failed  on  the  eve  of 
the  war.  Mr.  Asquith  himself  crossed  over  to 
Dublin  and  went  out  of  his  way — some  thought 
too  far  out  of  his  way — to  be  conciliatory  to  the 
rebels.  Mr.  Lloyd  George — who  has  since 
shown  his  abilities  as  a  negotiator  on  a  larger 
field — was  charged  with  the  task  of  bringing 
parties  together.  He  was  within  an  ace  of  success. 

The  Ulster  Unionist  Council  met.  Under  the 
terms  of  the  Ulster  Covenant  the  Unionists  of 
all  the  nine  Ulster  counties  had  bound  them- 
selves to  stand  or  fall  together.    But  if  the  pro- 


A  SETTLEMENT  IN  SIGHT       181 

posals  of  the  Government  were  to  be  accepted,  it 
was  necessary  that  the  counties  of  Cavan,  Mo- 
naghan,  and  Donegal  should  stand  out  and  ac- 
cept the  rule  of  the  Parliament  in  Dublin.  After 
long  consideration  they  agreed  to  waive  their 
rights  under  the  Covenant  and  to  place  them- 
selves at  the  disposal  of  the  Council.  It  has 
been  said  that  they  only  yielded  to  the  argument 
that  thus  they  would  "kill  Home  Rule."  But 
that  is  not  true.  The  effect  of  their  decision  on 
the  fate  of  the  Home  Rule  Bill  was  never  even 
mentioned.  The  only  question  discussed  was 
that  of  national  expediency,  the  desirability  of 
bringing  Ireland  into  line  on  the  side  of  the  Al- 
lies, then  hard  pressed,  and  of  presenting  a  unit- 
ed front  to  the  world.  And  indeed,  had  the  de- 
cision of  the  Ulster  Council  been  taken  as  a 
matter  of  party  tactics,  it  would  have  been  an 
extremely  venturesome  gamble.  For  the  Con- 
vention of  the  Nationalists  of  Ulster,  which  fol- 
lowed later,  agreed  to  the  exclusion  of  the  six 
counties  of  Antrim,  Down,  Armagh,  London- 
derry, Tyrone,  and  Fermanagh  from  the  opera- 
tion of  the  Home  Rule  Act.  There  was,  how- 
ever, one  point  on  which  the  parties  were  not 
agreed.  The  Unionists  wished  the  exclusion  of 
the  six  counties  to  be  " definite,' '  while  the  Na- 
tionalists declared  that  it  should  be  "provision- 


182    CONSPIEACY  AND  REBELLION 

al,"  i.e.,  that,  as  Mr.  Lloyd  George  had  pro- 
posed, it  should  be  subject  to  revision,  as  part 
of  a  scheme  of  general  Imperial  reconstruction, 
a  year  after  the  termination  of  the  war. 

The  difference  was  serious,  indeed  it  was 
fundamental,  but  it  might  perhaps  have  been 
adjusted  in  view  of  the  great  Imperial  necessi- 
ties of  the  time,  the  shock  of  Civil  War,  and  the 
desire  of  the  Unionists  and  of  Mr.  Redmond 
that  Ireland  should  play  her  full  part  in  the 
great  world  struggle. 

Thus,  as  Mr.  Redmond  saw  clearly,  did  Ire- 
land out  of  evil  get  a  second  and  most  unexpect- 
ed opportunity.  Once,  in  1914,  had  the  chance 
presented  itself,  and  she  let  it  slip.  And  now  it 
came  to  her  two  years  later.  Had  Ireland  taken 
the  first  chance,  and  said  to  Britain,  "Your 
cause  is  mine,"  there  is  no  reasonable  measure 
of  self-government,  short  of  separation,  which 
she  might  not  have  asked  for  and  received.  Irish 
Unionists,  even  though  they  might  have  but  lan- 
guid confidence  in  the  merits  of  Irish  admin-/ 
istration,  would  have  felt  it  churlish  to  deny 
men  who  had  taken  their  share  of  the  war; 
they  would  have  thought  that,  after  all,  they  had 
been  true  to  the  flag,  and  would  have  been  con- 
tent to  bury  the  old  animosities  and  suspicions 
in  the  trenches  where  the  wearers  of  the  Orange 
•>and  the  Green  lay  entombed  together. 


SINN  FEIN  BLOCKS  THE  WAY    183 

After  the  rebellion  Ireland  could  not  hope  for 
snch  full  concessions,  though  even  then  she 
might  have  got  much,  but,  in  the  spirit  of  Dr. 
O'Dwyer's  letter,  she  again  flung  away  the  sub- 
stance for  the  shadow.  The  Eoman  Catholic 
Hierarchy  of  Ulster  had  been  the  bitterest  op- 
ponents of  exclusion  in  the  Nationalist  Conven- 
tion ;  their  colleague  in  the  south  set  the  heather 
on  fire.  At  once  Sinn  Fein  raised  a  cry  against 
Partition.  The  pause  in  the  negotiations, 
caused  by  the  different  limitations  set  on  exclu- 
sion by  the  Unionists  and  Nationalists,  gave  the 
chorus  time  to  gain  volume,  and  as  it  gained  in 
volume  so  did  Mr.  Eedmond  find  himself  com- 
pelled to  stiffen  his  back  on  the  point  of  "provi- 
sional" exclusion,  or  to  see  his  power,  already 
waning,  disappear  altogether.  On  the  Union- 
ists the  effect  of  Dr.  O'Dwyer's  letter  and  the 
outburst  of  Kepublican  fury  was  to  convince 
them  that  concessions  made  to  promote  unity 
would  be  made  in  vain,  while  the  Government 
saw  in  the  unrepentant  attitude  of  Sinn  Fein  a 
confirmation  of  the  view  of  the  southern  Union- 
ists that  the  establishment  of  a  Parliament  in 
which  Sinn  Fein  would  be  powerful,  and  while 
Ireland  was  in  such  an  unsettled  condition, 
would  be  a  dangerous  experiment,  which  might 
materially  prejudice  the  conduct  of  the  war.  Ac- 


184    CONSPIEACY  AND  EEBELLION 

cordingly  on  July  24th — by  a  strange  coinci- 
dence it  was  on  that  same  day  two  years  before 
that  the  conference  at  Buckingham  Palace  had 
broken  down — Mr.  Asquith  announced  in  Par- 
liament that  the  Government  had  abandoned  the 
attempt  at  a  settlement. 

The  history  of  these  few  weeks  has  been  thus 
dwelt  upon  as  one  of  the  most  pregnant  phases 
of  the  revolutionary  movement.  It  reveals  Sinn 
Fein  as  the  sworn  enemy  of  any  attempt  at  set- 
tlement by  consent,  a  fact  of  the  highest  impor- 
tance in  the  consideration  of  contemporary  Irish 
politics.  From  a  broader  point  of  view  it  is 
deeply  interesting  in  that  it  is  perhaps  the  first 
instance  of  the  Eoman  Catholic  hierarchy  rang- 
ing itself  on  the  side  of  revolution  based  upon 
the  most  extreme  doctrines  of  Socialism. 

As  has  just  been  said,  the  southern  Unionists 
had,  while  the  negotiations  were  in  progress, 
impressed  on  the  Government  the  risk  of  erect- 
ing an  Irish  Legislature  in  the  then  state  of  the 
country.  It  has  been  the  fashion  to  treat  warn- 
ings from  that  quarter  as  the  creations  of  a  fe- 
vered and  prejudiced  imagination,  but  in  this 
instance  at  least  they  had  solid  foundation. 
Even  while  they  were  being  uttered  Count  Bern- 
storfr"  was  informing  his  Foreign  Office  that  the 
reorganisation  of  the  Irish  Kepublicans  was 


A  FIGHT  FOE  A  SEE  185 

proceeding  apace,  and  that  he  had  supplied  them 
with  the  money  of  which  they  stood  in  need. 
The  Republican  junta  in  America  observed  the 
action  of  the  Bishop  of  Limerick  with  great  ap- 
proval, and  took  measures  to  provide  him  with 
a  colleague  of  pronounced  views.  It  chanced 
that  about  that  time  the  bishopric  of  Cork  fell 
vacant.  Among  the  prominent  candidates  was 
one  of  moderate  opinions  and  friendly  to  the 
British  connection.  Another  was  Dr.  Daniel  Co- 
halan. Count  Bernstorif  greatly  interested  him- 
self in  the  matter,  and  on  August  23rd  tele- 
graphed as  follows  to  the  German  Foreign  Office : 
"The  Bishop  of  Cork  having  died,  there  is  a 
sharp  contest  over  the  succession.  The  present 
Assistant  Bishop,  Daniel  Cohalan,  is  the  choice 
of  the  local  clergy ;  but  England  is  using  unusual 

efforts  to  have appointed. is  strongly 

anti-German,  although  Germany,  at  our  request, 
released  him  shortly  after  the  outbreak  of  war, 
Assistant-Bishop  Cohalan  is  cousin  of  Judge 
Cohalan,  and  strongly  Nationalist  and  pro-Ger- 
man. He  was  the  intermediary  between  the  in- 
surgent Cork  Volunteers  and  the  British  mili- 
tary authorities,  and  publicly  exposed  the  gross 
breach  of  faith  of  the  English  with  the  surren- 
dered men.  Hence  the  effort  to  defeat  him 
through  the  English  Envoy  at  the  Vatican.  .  .  . 


186    CONSPIRACY  AND  REBELLION 

It  would  have  a  great  moral  effect  in  Rome  if 
Cohalan  were  chosen.  If  Germany  can  exert 
any  influence  to  bring  about  this  result  it  would 
defeat  the  English  intrigue  aimed  against  her 
interests." 

What  efforts  Germany  made  must  be  a  mat- 
ter of  surmise.  Certain  it  is  that  Dr.  Daniel 
Cohalan  is  now  the  Bishop  of  Cork. 


CHAPTER  XII 

MAKERS   OF   MISCHIEF 

For  a  moment  let  us  turn  our  eyes  from  the 
United  Kingdom  to  the  Continent,  that  we  may 
view  Irish  affairs  in  their  relation  to  the  war. 
While  Sinn  Fein  was  making  its  final  prepara- 
tions for  rebellion — the  coincidence  could  hardly 
have  been  accidental — France  was  battling  for 
her  very  life ;  while  Dublin  was  being  battered 
out  of  shape  Verdun  was  crumbling  out  of  exist- 
ence. The  battle  of  Jutland  was  fought  in  May, 
and  was  celebrated  by  the  Irish  Republicans  in 
verses  recited,  amid  wild  applause,  in  the  revo- 
lutionary concert  halls.*  While  the  Govern- 
ment at  home  was  striving  for  settlement,  and 
Sinn  Fein  was  making  it  impossible,  the  battles 
of  the  Somme  were  raging.    While  Dr.  0  'Dwyer 

*  A  couple  of  verses  will  show  the  nature  of  this  effusion : 

The  Bats  Came  Out. 
Britannia  rules  the  waves,  Britons  never  shall  be  slaves! 
We've  been  told  the  tale  so  often  that  we've  scarcely  room 
for  doubt; 
Irish  rebels  in  their  graves,  done  to  death  by  cowardly  knaves 
Would  sleep  peacefully,  I'm  certain,  if  they  knew  the  rata 
came  out.  .  .  . 

187 


188  MAKEES  OF  MISCHIEF 

was  denouncing  the  brutality  of  General  Max- 
well, Nurse  Cavell  and  Captain  Fryatt  were  be- 
ing done  to  death  by  the  allies  of  the  Irish  Sep- 
aratists. As  always,  England's  extremity  was 
Ireland's  opportunity,  and  the  Eepublicans 
used  it  to  the  full. 

Their  attitude  was  both  singular  and  signifi- 
cant. It  might  have  been  expected  that  the  fail- 
ure of  the  rising  would  have  left  them  in  a  chas- 
tened mood,  of  which  their  moderate  leaders 
would  have  taken  advantage  to  recall  them 
from  the  dangerous  paths  into  which  they  had 
strayed.  Conciliation  was  in  the  air.  Mr.  As- 
quith  had  been  polite  to  the  point  of  flattery  in 
his  talks  with  the  captive  rebels,  the  spirit  of  ne- 
gotiation was  abroad,  and  they  not  only  stood 
aloof,  but  bestirred  themselves  to  prevent  agree- 
ment. Some  little  sign  from  them  would  have 
done  much  to  diminish  the  rigour  of  Mr.  Eed- 
mond's  attitude,  but  it  was  not  given.  Whether 
he  desired  it  or  no,  he  was  forced,  if  he  and  his 
party  were  not  to  be  swept  from  the  stage,  to 
meet  the  Ulster  demand  with  an  uncompromis- 
ing negative. 

Nay  more.     Sinn  Fein  took  heart  from  the 

The  blood  of  murdered  Irishmen  appeals  to  Heaven  once  again; 

The  fleet  that  shelled  old   Dublin   town  have  got   a  clean 
knockout. 
True  Irish  hearts  will  ever  pray  God  will  speed  the  coming  day 

When  Britain 's  fleet  is  swept  away  when  next  the  rats  come  out. 


COMPROMISES  FAIL  189 

negotiations  set  on  foot  by  Mr.  Lloyd  George. 
Outwardly  denouncing  the  Government  as  bar- 
barously tyrannical,  it  secretly  construed  its  de- 
sire for  settlement  as  a  proof  of  abject  weak- 
ness and  grew  more  insolent  and  defiant  the 
while  it  pursued  its  negotiations  with  Germany. 
Sinn  Fein  Clubs  sprang  up  all  over  the  country 
until  within  a  few  months  they  were  counted  in 
hundreds ;  the  Irish  Volunteers  swelled  from  a 
brigade  into  a  couple  of  Army  Corps. 

Numerous  attempts  were  made  by  the  more 
moderate  Nationalists  to  stem  the  Republican 
advance  by  diverting  the  popular  demand  into 
less  dangerous  channels.  The  Irish  Nation 
League  was  formed  at  Omagh  in  August,  as  a 
half-way  house  between  the  Parliamentarians 
and  the  Republicans.  It  came  to  nothing.  Mr. 
Redmond  tried  to  retain  the  constituencies  by 
motions  in  Parliament  for  inquiries  into  the 
events  of  the  rebellion,  the  abolition  of  martial 
law,  and  the  release  of  the  deportees.  The  Gov- 
ernment made  some  concessions.  Sir  John 
Maxwell  was  recalled;  a  new  Chief  Secretary 
was  appointed;  over  three-quarters  of  the  in- 
terned prisoners  were  released.  It  was  all  in 
vain:  Sinn  Fein  pursued  its  course  unmoved 
and  unrelenting.  Throughout  the  autumn  it  was 
beseeching  Germany  to  send  an  expedition,  and 


190  MAKERS  OF  MISCHIEF 

to  establish  bases  for  submarines  and  Zeppelins 
in  the  west  of  Ireland.  In  December  it  was 
pressing  the  German  Government  for  a  favour- 
able reply,  at  the  very  moment  that  the  Man- 
chester Guardian  was  calling  for  a  general  am- 
nesty as  a  step  to  perfect  harmony,  and  that  the 
Daily  News  was  proclaiming  that  it  was  useless 
to  expect  any  improvement  in  Ireland's  senti- 
ments while  the  rebels  were  interned  at  Fron- 
goch.  Six  hundred  were  released,  and  Sinn 
Fein  became  more  irreconcilable. 

In  February  Count  Plunkett  was  elected 
member  for  North  Roscommon  with  over  three 
thousand  votes  against  less  than  seven  hundred 
cast  for  Mr.  Redmond's  candidate.  And  then 
Mr.  Redmond  made  a  last  attempt  to  stem  the 
current,  with  a  motion  proposed  by  Mr.  T.  P. 
0  'Connor : 

1 '  That,  with  a  view  to  strengthening  the  hands 
of  the  Allies  in  achieving  the  recognition  of  the 
equal  rights  of  small  nations  and  the  principle 
of  nationality  against  the  opposite  German 
principles  of  military  domination  and  Govern- 
ment without  the  consent  of  the  governed,  it  is 
essential  without  further  delay  to  confer  upon 
Ireland  the  free  institutions  long  promised  to 
her."* 

*  March  7th,  1917. 


LLOYD  GEOEGE  SPEAKS  OUT  191 

Mr.  Lloyd  George,  who  by  this  time  was 
Prime  Minister,  speaking  as  a  Home  Euler,  said 
that  the  Cabinet  was  ready  to  give  self-govern- 
ment to  that  part  of  Ireland  which  desired  it, 
bnt  not  to  that  part  which  rejected  it.  It  was 
impossible  to  force  any  one  part  of  Ireland  to 
live  nnder  a  law  which  it  did  not  approve,  least 
of  all  in  the  circumstances  then  existing.  There 
could  be  no  question  of  imposing  "Home  Eule" 
on  the  people  of  the  north-east,  as  hostile  to 
Irish  rule  as  the  rest  of  Ireland  is  to  British 
rule,  yea,  and  as  ready  to  rebel  against  this  as 
the  rest  of  Ireland  is  to  revolt  against  British 
rule.    He  then  moved  the  following  amendment : 

"That  this  House  would  welcome  a  settle- 
ment which  would  produce  a  better  understand- 
ing between  Ireland  and  the  rest  of  the  United 
Kingdom,  but  considers  it  impossible  to  impose 
by  force  on  any  section  or  part  of  Ireland  a  form 
of  Government  which  has  not  their  assent." 

Mr.  Eedmond  rejected  the  amendment.  The 
time  for  conferences  and  negotiations,  he  said, 
had  gone  by.  He  denied  the  right  of  minorities 
to  call  check  to  the  spirit  of  a  nation;  he  de- 
manded the  Home  Eule  Act,  the  whole  Act,  and 
nothing  but  the  Act.  The  state  of  Ireland,  he 
said,  was  very  serious.  The  constitutional 
movement  had,  by  forty  years  of  toil,  practically 


192  MAKEES  OF  MISCHIEF 

eliminated  the  revolutionary  agitation,  and  now 
its  work  was  being  wrecked  in  sight  of  port. 

Were  one  disposed  for  controversy,  it  might 
be  pointed  out  that  Mr.  Redmond  put  the  effect 
of  the  constitutional  upon  the  revolutionary 
movement  too  high,  and  placed  too  generous  an 
estimate  on  the  value  of  the  Home  Rule  Act  as 
an  implement  of  conciliation.  For  at  the  very 
time  when  the  success  of  the  measure  was  se- 
cured, and  even  before  it  was  introduced,  the 
forces  of  revolution,  which  Mr.  Redmond  de- 
clared had  been  practically  eliminated,  were  de- 
ciding the  measure  and  concerting  rebellion. 
But  that  may  pass. 

Having  made  his  protest,  Mr.  Redmond  left 
the  House  with  his  followers,  and  the  debate 
ended  without  a  decision  being  taken.  The  next 
day  the  Nationalists  published  a  manifesto,  pro- 
claiming their  loyalty  to  the  cause  of  the  Allies, 
though  compelled  to  go  into  opposition  to  the 
Government,  and  appealing  to  the  Irishmen  of 
America  and  the  Dominions  to  put  pressure  on 
the  British  Government  to  act  towards  Ireland 
in  conformity  with  the  principles  for  which  the 
Allies  were  fighting  in  Europe. 

Even  this  dramatic  and  adroit  move  met  with 
no  response  from  Sinn  Fein.  Then,  if  ever,  was 
its  opportunity.  The  wording  of  Mr.  Redmond's 


AMNESTY  ABUSED  193 

manifesto  could  be  read  to  include  a  demand 
for  self-government  on  the  broadest  lines.  ' '  The 
principles  for  which  the  Allies  are  fighting" 
might  even  be  construed  to  mean  complete  in- 
dependence. Why  then  did  Sinn  Fein  remain 
unmoved?  Surely,  for  one  reason  only — that  it 
knew  that  Mr.  Eedmond,  though  he  would  have 
taken  the  widest  form  of  self-government  if  it 
were  offered  him,  did  not  contemplate  severance 
from  the  Empire.  Because  of  that  he  was  still 
the  West  Briton,  the  helot  and  the  traitor. 

An  opportunity  soon  occurred  for  Sinn  Fein 
to  show  its  opinion  of  Mr.  Eedmond  and  to  give 
an  answer  to  the  Prime  Minister's  suggestion 
for  settlement.  Major  Willie  Eedmond  was 
killed  at  Messines,  dying,  by  a  pathetic  coinci- 
dence, among  the  Ulstermen.  Mr.  De  Valera 
was  nominated  for  East  Clare,  Major  Eed- 
mond's  constituency.  On  the  next  day,  June 
15th,  1917,  the  Government  proclaimed  a  gen- 
eral amnesty  and  all  the  Irish  prisoners  were 
released.  They  availed  themselves  of  their  lib- 
erty to  make  speeches  of  the  most  seditious 
character  up  and  down  the  island,  declaring  that 
"England  is  beaten  to  the  ropes;"  "France  is 
bled  white;"  "Germany  is  no  enemy  of  Ire- 
land. "  "  England, ' '  cried  one  orator,  * '  has  been 
an  enemy  in  the  past,  why  should  we  not  assist 
her  enemies  now?"    Another  speaker  supplied 


194  MAKERS  OF  MISCHIEF 

the  answer:  "Get  ready;  keep  getting  ready; 
when  the  call  comes  stand  to  arms." 

By  this  time  America  was  in  the  war.  But 
that  did  not  prevent ' '  The  Provisional  Govern- 
ment of  the  Irish  Republic"  from  sending  its 
"Ambassador,"  Dr.  Patrick  McCartan,*  to 
President  Wilson  and  Congress,  with  a  commu- 
nication which  contained  the  following  passage : 

"Our  Nationalism  is  not  founded  upon  griev- 
ances. We  are  opposed  not  to  English  mis- 
government  but  to  English  government  in 
Ireland.  .  .  .  While  prepared,  when  the  oppor- 
tunity arises,  to  assert  our  independence  by  the 
one  force  which  commands  universal  respect 
and  to  accept  aid  from  any  quarter  to  that  end, 
we  hope  Americans  will  see  their  way  to  aid  in 
doing  for  Ireland  what  they  did  for  Cuba." 

Considering  the  circumstances,  it  is  probable 
that  no  more  astonishing  communication  was 
ever  made  to  the  head  of  a  great  nation  than 
this.  It  was  presented  in  the  name  of  the  Irish 
Republic,  an  organisation  hostile   and  rebel- 

*  Dr.  McCartan  was  at  that  time  a  fugitive  from  Ireland. 
He  is  now  Dispensary  Doctor  for  the  Omagh  District  Council 
and  has  leave  of  absence,  his  return  to  his  duties  being  delayed 
for  what  have  been  stated  in  the  Council  to  be  "  well-known 
reasons. ' '  He  is  also  a  Sinn  Fein  M.P.  and  is,  or  recently  was, 
an  inmate  of  an  American  gaol. 


DR.  McCABTAN'S  EMBASSY       195 

lions  to  a  State  on  whose  side  America  was  then 
fighting  and  in  active  alliance  with  Germany, 
with  whom  America  was  at  war.  It  was  framed 
by  a  junta  one  of  whose  leading  members  had 
been  specially  recommended  as  a  reliable  agent 
for  organising  sabotage  in  the  United  States. 
And  America  was  asked  to  put  pressure  on 
England  to  give  Ireland  that  right  of  seces- 
sion which  half  a  century  before  she  had  re- 
fused to  her  own  dissentient  States  at  the  cost 
of  four  years  of  bitter  war. 

It  is  probable  that  in  sending  this  message, 
and  in  the  choice  of  the  ambassador  who  should 
convey  it,  Sinn  Fein  was  inspired  as  much  by  a 
desire  to  insult  the  President  as  by  any  hope  of 
receiving  a  favourable  reply.  In  the  days  when 
America  was  still  neutral  the  Irish-Americans 
had  abused  the  head  of  the  State  with  a  free- 
dom which  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic  it  is  dif- 
ficult to  understand.  The  exchange  of  neutral- 
ity for  active  co-operation  with  the  Allies  drove 
them  to  frenzy.  It  paralysed  their  energies,  it 
deprived  them  of  the  services  of  Count  Bern- 
storff,  Von  Igel,  and  the  rest  of  the  Teutonic 
horde ;  they  saw  their  fellow  Irishmen  in  Amer- 
ica swept  into  the  maelstrom  of  the  conscrip- 
tion which  they  had  successfully  resisted  in 
Ireland  as  the  barbarous  implement  of  blood- 
thirsty tyranny.  In  their  distress  these  hyphen- 


196  MAKERS  OF  MISCHIEF 

ated  citizens  of  the  United  States,  notwith- 
standing that  myriads  of  Irishmen  were  fighting 
for  America,  still  continued  to  plot  for  Ger- 
many's success,  though  force  of  circumstances 
compelled  them  to  transfer  their  main  energies 
from  New  York  to  Berlin. 

In  America  what  work  was  done  was  through 
the  Society  of  the  Friends  of  Irish  Freedom, 
founded  in  1916,  of  which  Mr.  Jeremiah 
O'Leary  was  President,  with  Professor  Kuno 
Meyer  and  Mr.  St.  John  Gaffney,  ex-Consul- 
General  of  the  United  States  at  Munich,  as  his 
principal  colleagues.  When  America  entered 
the  war  Kuno  Meyer  returned  to  Germany, 
where  he  again  worked  with  St.  John  Gaffney 
and  a  Mr.  Chatterton-Hill,  and  founded  the  Ger- 
man-Irish Society,  which  was  the  European 
counterpart  of  the  Friends  of  Irish  Freedom. 
Among  the  officials  of  this  Society  were  Herr 
Erzberger,  Baron  von  Reichthofen,  Count 
Westarp,  the  leader  of  the  Junkers  in  the 
Reichstag,  Professor  Edouard  Meyer,  Profes- 
sor Schiemann,  and  many  other  eminent  per- 
sons. The  Society  ran  a  monthly  review,  Irische 
Blatter,  of  which  Chatterton-Hill  was  editor. 

It  is  important  to  observe  that  the  first  num- 
ber of  this  magazine  appeared  in  May,  1917,  a 
month  after  the  United  States  had  declared  war 


THE  GERMAN-IRISH  SOCIETY      197 

against  Germany,  driven  to  that  extreme  meas- 
ure, so  repugnant  to  the  genius  of  the  Ameri- 
can people,  by  the  conviction  that  German  suc- 
cess would  be  fatal  to  civilisation,  liberty,  and 
moral  law.  Yet  in  the  opening  address  of  the 
German-Irish  Society  and  in  the  pages  of 
Irische  Blatter  we  find  the  following  passages : 

1 '  The  war  has  proved  that  Germany  has  very 
few  friends.  But  the  Irish  have  acted  as  friends 
at  home  as  well  as  in  the  United  States,  and 
Germany  must  not  underestimate  the  value  of 
Irish  friendship.  From  the  beginning  of  the 
war  the  American-Irish  adopted  the  German 
cause  with  enthusiasm,  and  in  alliance  with  the 
German- Americans  conducted  a  courageous 
fight  for  true  neutrality.  There  is  no  doubt 
that,  but  for  the  support  of  the  Irish  organisa- 
tions, the  politically  unorganised  German- 
Americans  would  have  been  condemned  to  im- 
potence. .  .  .  The  German-Irish  Society  will 
devote  its  energies  to  reopening  Ireland  to  the 
world,  and  especially  to  Germany.  It  will  .  .  . 
generally  and  in  every  way  further  the  pro- 
gressive development  of  the  Emerald  Isle  in 
the  interests  of  the  German  as  well  as  the  Irish 
people.' ' 

So  much  for  the  inaugural  address.  Two 
points  may  be  noted.  First,  the  Irish  activities 
which  so  embarrassed  the  American  Govern- 


198  MAKEES  OF  MISCHIEF 

ment  in  the  period  of  neutrality.  Second,  the 
promise  to  throw  Ireland  open  especially  to 
Germany,  whose  crimes  had  dragged  America 
reluctantly  into  war.  The  following  are  pas- 
sages from  page  102  of  Irische  Blatter  of  May, 
1917: 

"When  the  West-Irish  harbours  serve  as 
bases  for  U-boats,  and  a  large  part  of  the  coun- 
try is  in  the  hands  of  one  of  the  organised  revo- 
lutionary armies,  then  will  England's  rule  over 
the  sea  quickly  come  to  an  end.  Not  only  can 
many  English  ships  carrying  munitions  and  the 
necessaries  of  life  be  sunk,  but  others  can  be 
captured  and  towed  into  Irish  ports  to  supply 
the  Irish  army  with  munitions  and  the  Irish 
people  with  food.  Thus  would  England  be 
handed  over  to  her  enemies  and  the  war  quickly 
brought  to  an  end. ' ' 

Here  we  pause  to  contemplate  the  prospect 
opened  up,  not  only  for  Great  Britain  but  for 
America,  by  the  Friends  of  Irish  Freedom  and 
the  German-Irish  Society.  Secured  in  their 
possession  of  the  Irish  coast,  U-boats  were  to 
have  the  Atlantic  traffic  at  their  mercy.  Amer- 
ican transports  to  be  "sunk  without  trace," 
their  ships,  like  those  carrying  the  Red  Ensign, 
to  be  sunk  or  captured  at  will.  The  war  would 
be  swiftly  brought  to  an  end,  and  America 


GEOWTH  OF  SINN  FEIN  199 

would  share  in  the  defeat.  And  this  was  the 
programme  of  American  citizens,  directed  not, 
as  in  the  case  of  England,  against  a  nation  which 
had  imposed  her  rule  upon  them,  but  against 
the  country  of  their  own  choosing. 

Meanwhile  in  Ireland  Sinn  Fein  was  prosper- 
ing amazingly.  De  Valera  was  elected  for  East 
Clare  by  a  huge  majority;  Mr.  Cosgrave  won 
the  suffrages  of  Kilkenny;  in  South  Longford 
Mr.  MacGuinness  wrested  a  seat  from  the  Par- 
liamentarians. A  solemn  resolution  was  taken 
that  no  representatives  of  Sinn  Fein  would  rec- 
ognise British  rule  by  taking  their  seats  at 
Westminster,  thus  incidentally  sparing  them- 
selves the  painful  necessity  of  committing  wil- 
ful and  deliberate  perjury.  The  Clubs  contin- 
ued to  multiply,*  and  the  armies,  to  which 
Irische  Blatter  so  hopefully  referred,  to  in- 
crease.! The  negotiations  which  had  been  in 
progress  in  December  had  for  the  time  come  to 
an  end  in  consequence  of  Germany's  refusal  to 
send  troops — she  was  by  now  beginning  to  feel 

*At  the  Sinn  Fein  Convention,  October  25th,  1917,  1009 
Clubs  were  represented  by  1700  delegates.  It  was  stated  by  the 
Secretary  that  the  total  number  of  Clubs  was  about  1200,  with 
a  membership  of  about  250,000. 

t  Mr.  Duke,  Chief  Secretary  for  Ireland,  estimated  that  the 
Sinn  Fein  Volunteers  numbered  200,000  men  in  October,  1917. 
—Hansard,  October  24th,  1917. 


200  MAKEES  OF  MISCHIEF 

the  pinch — though  she  was  ready  and  willing 
to  send  arms  and  provide  money. 

Disappointed  in  their  hope  of  another  Civil 
War,  the  high  spirit  of  the  Sinn  Feiners  found 
an  outlet  in  those  forms  of  crime  which  habit- 
ually distinguish  moments  of  political  excite- 
ment in  Ireland — shooting  of  police,  robbery  of 
arms,  cattle-driving,  and  boycotting.  One  case 
of  boycotting  deserves  commemoration.  In 
November,  1917,  Mrs.  Eyan,  a  school  mistress, 
was  driven  out  of  her  school  by  a  body  of  Sinn 
Feiners ;  the  school  was  closed  by  order  of  Sinn 
Fein  and  pickets  were  posted  to  prevent  it  be- 
ing reopened  until  another  teacher  was  ap- 
pointed. Mrs.  Eyan's  offence  was  that,  on  the 
occasion  of  Lord  Kitchener's  death  in  1916,  she 
had  played  the  Dead  March  in  Saul  in  the  pres- 
ence of  her  pupils.  What  is  one  to  think  of  a 
great  national  movement  for  liberty  that  can 
descend  to  such  pettiness? 

Again,  it  is  significant  that  these  activities 
coincided  with  an  attempt  to  reach  a  settlement 
of  the  Irish  question  more  elaborate  and  con- 
taining greater  presages  of  success  than  ever 
before.  Out  of  twelve  months  of  groping  for  a 
possible  solution  emerged  the  Convention,  to 
which  were  nominated,  or  in  some  cases  elected, 
103  members,  representative  of  every  shade  of 


WEECKEES  OF  PEACE  201 

opinion,  and  perhaps  more  representative  of 
Ireland  as  a  whole  than  any  other  body  which 
had  assembled  since  the  Union.  Great  hopes 
were  attached  to  the  meeting  of  this  assembly, 
and  therefore  it  at  once  became  the  object  of 
Sinn  Fein  to  wreck  them. 

From  the  outset  Sinn  Fein  stood  aloof,  refus- 
ing to  send  delegates  to  the  Convention.  It  de- 
parted from  its  attitude  of  neutrality  when  it 
began  to  get  abroad  that  a  most  promising 
spirit  of  harmony  and  goodwill  pervaded  the 
meetings.  To  prevent  any  such  alarming  de- 
velopment Sinn  Fein  became  threatening  and 
disorderly,  to  such  a  point  that  Mr.  Lloyd 
George  had  to  give  a  solemn  warning  in  Parlia- 
ment that  he  would  not  allow  incitements  to  re- 
bellion, nor  preparation  for  rebellion,  nor  any 
separatist  propaganda  for  the  "sovereign  in- 
dependence' '  of  Ireland. 

Then  the  Eoman  Catholic  Church  took  fright. 
The  Bishops  of  Kildare,  Clonfert,  and  Achonry 
preached  in  condemnation  of  the  revolutionary 
doctrines.  A  letter  from  Cardinal  Logue  was 
read  in  all  the  churches  of  the  Archdiocese  of 
Armagh  on  November  25th,  in  which  he  con- 
demned : — 

"An  utopian  and  ill-conceived  agitation, 
which  could  not  fail  to  be  followed  by  present 


202  MAKERS  OF  MISCHIEF 

suffering,  disorder,  and  danger,  and  which  in 
the  future  would  surely  produce  disaster,  de- 
feat, and  ruin — and  all  this  in  pursuit  of  a 
dream  which  no  man  of  sound  sense  could  hope 
to  see  realised:  the  establishment  of  an  Irish 
Republic  whether  by  an  appeal  to  the  potentates 
of  Europe  sitting  in  the  Peace  Conference  or  by 
an  appeal  to  force." 

Thus  did  the  elders  of  the  Church  throw  over 
the  younger  clergy  and  others,  more  mature  in 
age,  but  equally  hot  in  blood,  and  say  to  Sinn 
Fein  "Thus  far  and  no  farther.' ' 

Sinn  Fein  was  as  deaf  to  the  orders  of  the 
Church  as  it  had  been  to  British  advances  and 
Nationalist  desire  for  settlement.  New  Ireland 
replied  to  the  Bishop  that  "Ireland  had  learned 
in  a  terrible  school  not  to  regard  eminent  ec- 
clesiastics as  the  supreme  authority  in  questions 
of  politics."  Mr.  De  Valera,  protesting  his  at- 
tachment to  religion,  maintained  that  the  laws 
of  the  Church  did  not  condemn  his  doctrines. 

So  closed  the  year  1917,  Unionists  and  Na- 
tionalists striving  hard  and  honestly  to  find  a 
basis  for  agreement;  Sinn  Fein  striving  hard 
and  lawlessly  to  make  their  efforts  of  no  effect. 
In  order  to  achieve  its  purpose  Sinn  Fein  at 
this  time  made  a  further  movement  towards  the 
party  of  revolutionary  Labour.  New  Ireland,  in 


GERMANY  ONCE  MORE  203 

October,  enunciated  the  opinion  that  of  all 
European  parties  Socialism  most  nearly  ap- 
proached the  idealism  of  Christianity,  an  asser- 
tion not  in  itself  remarkable,  but  interesting  as 
marking  the  development  of  the  alliance  which 
had  begun  before  the  rebellion.  This  further 
advance  towards  the  extreme  Labour  Party 
was  perhaps  in  some  measure  Sinn  Fein's  reply 
to  the  admonitions  of  the  Church.  We  have 
seen  how  in  its  early  days  the  movement  suf- 
fered no  little  damage  from  the  suggestion  that 
it  had  anti-clerical  implications,  and  it  is  pos- 
sible that  it  now  turned  towards  a  party  which 
had  scant  reverence  for  ecclesiastical  thunder- 
ings  to  make  up  for  any  losses  it  might  sustain 
among  its  more  devout  adherents. 

But  there  was  another  reason  as  well.  The 
negotiations  between  Sinn  Fein  and  Germany, 
which  had  broken  down  in  the  closing  days  of 
1916,  had  been  resumed,  and  this  time  with  more 
practical  result.  True,  Germany  was  unable  to 
send  men,  for  these  were  becoming  more  scarce 
every  day,  but  she  could  send  arms  and  was 
making  elaborate  preparations  to  send  them. 

St.  Patrick's  Day,  1918,  was  celebrated  in 
Berlin  with  great  enthusiasm,  in  spite  of  the 
fact  that,  except  for  Dr.  Chatterton-Hill,  the 
celebrants  were  entirely  German.   Count  West- 


204  MAKERS  OF  MISCHIEF 

arp  presided  at  a  banquet  at  the  Hotel  Adlon, 
when  speeches  were  delivered  quite  in  the  vein 
of  those  of  the  Watertoast  Sympathisers.  Their 
tone  can  be  the  better  appreciated  if  it  be  re- 
membered that,  when  they  were  spoken,  Ger- 
many was  preparing  for  her  last  desperate 
throw  and  sorely  needed  every  atom  of  help 
that  she  could  get. 

Count  Westarp  laid  down  the  doctrine  that 
^a  people  which  was  incapable  of  a  righteous 
hatred  towards  their  mortal  enemies  was  also 
incapable  of  any  profound  devotion  to  their 
own  cause. "  England,  he  went  on,  which  had 
been  Ireland's  mortal  enemy,  was  now  Ger- 
many's mortal  enemy  as  well.  Germany  had 
never  thought  before  the  war  that  it  would  be 
her  mission  to  destroy  England's  maritime  su- 
premacy— here  one  pauses  to  reflect  on  the  arti- 
cles concocted  by  Casement  and  Kuno  Meyer  in 
1911,  and  the  toast  of  "Der  Tag" — but  she  had 
been  forced  into  the  task  and  was  in  a  position 
to  accomplish  it,  thanks  to  her  numerical  su- 
periority and  to  the  U-boats.  Councillor  of 
Legation  Von  Strumm,  who  represented  the 
Foreign  Office,  played  his  best  card  to  his  part- 
ner's lead.  It  was  recently  reported,  he  said, 
that  Ireland  was  quiet  and  that  an  Irish  Con- 
vention had  assembled  which  was  to  settle  her 


PATBICK'S  DAY  IN  BERLIN      205 

destinies  to  the  general  satisfaction.  But  now 
talk  of  the  Convention  had  ceased,  and  Lord 
French  had  gone  to  Dublin  to  "franquillise" 
Ireland.  They  knew  what  that  tranquillising 
meant :  the  people  of  Ceylon  and  the  Transvaal 
could  tell  them.  If,  as  Mr.  Asquith  had  said, 
England's  territorial  conquests  in  the  war  were 
to  come  before  the  Peace  Conference,  Ireland 
should  come  before  it  too.  Lord  French  might 
conquer  Ireland,  but  he  would  never  subjugate 
her,  and  Ireland  could  always  count  on  the  sym- 
pathy of  the  German  people. 

Dr.  Chatterton-Hill,  in  his  response  to  these 
assurances,  described  Sinn  Fein  as  "that  great 
political,  economic,  and  cultural  movement 
which  recognised  England  as  the  evil  genius  of 
Ireland,  and  which  thwarted  her  and  combated 
her  in  every  direction.' '  And  then  he  an- 
nounced that  "Ireland  was  on  the  eve  of  great 
events.' '  For  his  audience  this  dark  utterance 
held  no  mystery.  To  aid  her  great  offensive  on 
the  Western  Front,  Germany  had  arranged  to 
land  a  big  supply  of  arms  and  ammuniton  in 
Ireland.  Less  than  a  month  after  Dr.  Chatter- 
ton-Hill's  prophecy,  an  emissary  landed  on  the 
coast  of  Clare  to  announce  its  imminent  fulfil- 
ment. He  was  an  Irishman,  one  Dowling,  alias 
0  'Brien,  one  of  the  few  who  had  yielded  to  Case- 
ment's  seductions  at  Limburg.     A  few  weeks 


206  MAKEES  OF  MISCHIEF 

later,  in  May,  U-boats  left  Cuxhaven  laden  with 
arms  and  ammunition,  but  never  reached  their 
destination.  And  then  came  the  18th  of  July, 
when  Ludendorff  played  his  last  throw  at  the 
Marne  and  lost. 

So  perished  Casement's  dreams  of  German 
dominion  and  the  hopes  cherished  by  Sinn  Fein 
of  a  German  invasion  of  Ireland. 

But  Sinn  Fein  had  gained  something  by  its 
activities.  In  March  Mr.  Eedmond  died, 
brokenhearted  by  the  failure  of  his  policy  and 
by  domestic  sacrifices  made  in  vain,  and  with 
him  disappeared  the  most  formidable  opponent 
of  Eepublicanism  in  the  Nationalist  ranks. 
The  Convention,  too,  had  failed  to  arrive  at  a 
settlement.  Sir  Horace  Plunkett  summed  up 
the  cause  of  its  failure  in  two  words :  ' '  Ulster 
and  Customs." 

More  or  less  directly,  Sinn  Fein  had  been  in- 
strumental in  developing  these  obstacles.  It 
had  stiffened  the  Nationalist  demands  and  the 
Unionist  resistance.  It  had  widened  the  gulf 
between  the  two  great  schools  of  Irish  thought 
until  it  became  unbridgable.  There  was  room 
for  accommodation,  though  cramped  and  un- 
comfortable, in  previous  measures  of  Home 
Eule — the  exclusion  of  Unionist  Ulster,  for  ex- 
ample.   But  that  device,  artificial  and  difficult 


THE  NEW  MOVE  207 

at  the  best,  became  absolutely  impossible  in  a 
scheme  which  gave  the  Irish  Government  the 
power  of  erecting  a  tariff  wall.  The  success  of 
Sinn  Fein  in  upsetting  the  attempts  at  settle- 
ment by  consent  so  often  repeated  swept  away 
all  the  ambiguities  which  had  theretofore  ob- 
scured the  Irish  question,  and  made  it  a  clear 
issue. 

These  successes,  however,  were  only  partial 
and  negative.  They  were  more  than  counter- 
balanced by  the  defeat  of  Germany.  Deprived 
of  her  assistance,  Sinn  Fein  had  to  seek  other 
alliances,  and  in  the  article  in  New  Ireland  we 
have  an  indication  of  the  direction  in  which  its 
thoughts  were  turning. 


CHAPTER  Xin 

THE   BOLSHEVIK   ALLIANCE 

Time  was  when  the  American-Irish  were  united 
with  the  Russian  sojourners  in  the  great  Repub- 
lic in  very  cordial  friendship.  Those  were  the 
days  when  Bokhara  and  Merv  were  on  men's 
lips,  when  maps  of  Central  Asia  were  in  de- 
mand, when  people  shuddered  at  the  name  of 
Penjdeh,  and  the  slumbers  of  British  statesmen 
were  troubled  by  visions  of  the  Colossus  with 
one  foot  planted  at  Archangel  and  the  other  at 
Cape  Comorin.  The  Irish  in  America  also  had 
their  visions,  but  they  were  dissipated  by  the 
war  of  1906  and  the  destruction  of  Rodjestven- 
sky  's  Armada.  They  transferred  their  hopes  to 
Germany,  only  to  see  them  in  their  turn  shat- 
tered at  the  Marne.  But  in  her  death  agony 
Germany  had  constructed  a  force  to  which  the 
Irish  revolutionaries  turned  in  their  distress,  a 
Russia,  no  longer  the  especial  enemy  of  Eng- 
land, but  the  enemy  of  every  nation  that  aspired 
to  be  civilised. 

208 


LOOKING  TOWAEDS  EUSSIA      209 

The  way  to  this  renewal  of  the  old  friendship 
had  been  smoothed  by  Connolly  during  his  so- 
journ in  America.  His  hereditary  Fenianism, 
his  ardent  assertion  of  nationality  and  his  con- 
tempt of  the  policy  of  Mr.  Eedmond  and  the 
Parliamentarians,  gave  him  easy  access  to  such 
men  as  John  Devoy  and  Jeremiah  O'Leary, 
while  his  career  as  an  organiser  of  the  Indus- 
trial Workers  of  the  "World  brought  him  in  con- 
tact with  the  potential  Bolsheviki.  Accord- 
ingly we  find  the  merits  of  Lenin's  Government 
extolled  increasingly  as  the  fortunes  of  Ger- 
many wavered  in  the  balance  and  declined. 
Among  a  certain  section  of  the  Irish  Eepubli- 
cans  there  would  appear  to  have  been  at  first  a 
certain  hesitancy,  begotten  perhaps  of  the 
growing  fear  that  the  creation  of  the  Soviet 
Government  had  reacted  injuriously  to  Ger- 
many, perhaps — for  there  is  a  party  of  the 
Eight  as  well  as  of  the  Left  in  Sinn  Fein — of  an 
instinctive  dislike  of  the  new  doctrine. 

But  they  were  voices  crying  in  the  wilderness. 
As  has  been  shown,  Connolly's  robust  national- 
ism and  the  practicality  of  his  methods  had 
drawn  towards  him  men  like  Pearse,  who  grad- 
ually became  imbued  with  his  economic  doc- 
trines and  carried  the  infection  into  the  Sinn 
Fein  organisation.     There  were  others  whose 


210      THE  BOLSHEVIK  ALLIANCE 

sole  object  was  to  attain  independence,  and  who 
were  nof  too  nice  or  curious  as  to  the  source 
from  which  they  got  assistance,  and  others 
again  who  were  revolutionaries  first,  last,  and 
all  the  time,  and  whose  aim  was  destruction.  In 
a  movement  such  as  is  Sinn  Fein,  whose  ulti- 
mate sanction  is  force,  such  elements  are  certain 
to  overbear  the  intellectuals  and  idealists,  even 
if  they  have  no  direct  encouragement  from  its 
leaders. 

In  this  instance  the  extreme  revolutionary 
section  and  the  Bolshevik  alliance  had  firm 
friends  in  the  inner  circle  of  Sinn  Fein.  The 
men  who,  in  America,  played  the  leading  part 
in  the  formation  of  the  new  alliance  were  Dr. 
Patrick  McCartan  and  Liam  (anglice  Wil- 
liam) Mellowes.  A  few  words  are  here  neces- 
sary to  explain  the  position  held  by  these  men 
in  their  work  in  America. 

"When  the  United  States  went  into  the  war 
and  Count  Bernstorfr*  left  Washington,  the 
methods  of  transatlantic  conspirators  had  to 
be  completely  changed,  and  Mellowes  and  Mc- 
Cartan were  charged  with  the  direction  of  af- 
fairs. Both  had  left  Ireland  after  the  rebellion, 
in  which  Mellowes  commanded  a  force  operat- 
ing in  County  Galway.  There  is  reason  to  be- 
lieve that  he  had  spent  some  time  in  Germany 


NEW  AGENCIES  AT  WORK        211 

after  his  escape  from  Ireland,  and  it  is  certain 
that  in  New  York  he  was  working  in  association 
with  a  Baron  von  Rechlinghausen,  a  German 
agent,  one  of  their  objects  being  to  forward 
money  to  the  Turks  and  to  establish  a  mysteri- 
ous Turkish  organisation  in  America.  The  oth- 
er, and  the  main  object,  of  this  trio — Mellowes, 
McCartan,  and  Rechlinghausen — was  to  organ- 
ise another  revolution  in  Ireland  in  the  spring 
of  1918.  In  the  preceding  chapter  we  have  seen 
how  this  plot  failed,  how  Dowling  was  captured 
on  landing  in  County  Clare,  and  the  arms 
shipped  at  Cuxhaven  failed  to  reach  their  desti- 
nation. 

The  main  cause  of  the  failure  was  the  arrest 
of  McCartan  and  Mellowes  in  October,  1917. 
The  " ambassador' '  was  arrested  at  Halifax 
while  on  his  way  to  Ireland,  while  at  the  same 
time  Mellowes  was  captured  in  New  York  on  the 
eve  of  his  departure,  to  use  his  own  words,  "for 
the  Easter  sports  of  1918."  Documents  were 
found  in  Mellowes '  possession  dealing  with  the 
secret  history  of  the  1916  rebellion,  which  could 
not  have  reached  any  one  who  was  not  entirely 
in  the  confidence  of  Sinn  Fein.  One  of  them 
clears  up  the  mystery,  which  puzzled  the  Re- 
bellion Commission,  of  the  famous  order  for 
the  precautionary  arrest  of  the  revolutionary 
leaders  which  was  read  by  Alderman  Kelly  at  a 


212      THE  BOLSHEVIK  ALLIANCE 

meeting  of  the  Dublin  Corporation  on  April 
19th,  1916,  four  days  before  the  rising.  The  or- 
der was  given  to  Alderman  Kelly  by  Mr.  Little, 
the  editor  of  New  Ireland,  as  having  been  is- 
sued from  Dublin  Castle.  The  document  found 
in  Mellowes'  possession,  however,  shows  that  it 
was  a  forgery,  done  by  the  Sinn  Fein  extremists 
to  force  the  wavering  hands  of  Professor  Mac- 
Neill  and  to  precipitate  the  rebellion.*  In  both 
these  purposes  it  succeeded :  MacNeill  gave  the 
orders  for  the  Easter  Monday  operations, 
though,  as  we  have  seen,  he  cancelled  them. 

So  seriously  did  the  arrest  of  Mellowes  and 
McCartan  compromise  the  revolutionary  plans, 
that  in  November  Sinn  Fein  was  compelled  to 
send  a  long  despatch  to  their  New  York  agents 
with  a  new  set  of  instructions.  This  despatch 
was  carried  by  a  certain  Thomas  Welsh,  who 
was  arrested  as  he  was  disembarking  from  the 
Celtic  and  was  taken  from  him  as  he  was  at- 
tempting to  tear  it  to  pieces.f 

"General"  Mellowes,  therefore,  holds  a  high 
place  in  Sinn  Fein,  but  that  held  by  Dr.  McCar- 
tan is  still  higher.  He  is  a  medical  man,  a  Fel- 
low of  the  College  of  Surgeons,  and  the  Sinn 
Fein  " ambassador' '  to  the  United  States,  in 

*  Freeman's  Journal,  November  29th,   1917. 
1[IUd.,  November  27th,  1917. 


A  SINN  FEIN  "AMBASSADOE"    213 

which  capacity  we  have  already  seen  him  ap- 
proaching the  head  of  the  State.  And  in  that 
capacity  also  he  was  negotiating  with  the  "am- 
bassador" of  the  Kussian  Soviet  Kepublic.  Of 
the  nature  of  Mellowes'  connection  with  the  Bol- 
shevists we  have  no  precise  knowledge  except 
that  imparted  by  the  Irish  Labour  organ,  the 
Voice  of  Labour,  in  the  following  paragraph: 

"Almost  every  message  we  get  from  America 
tells  us  how  strongly  an  old  friend,  Liam  Mel- 
lowes, stands  up  for  the  Eussian  fighters  for 
freedom."  * 

Dr.  McCartan's  relations  are  infinitely  more 
definite.  So  far  back  as  January,  1918,  his 
sympathy  with  the  Eussian  Soviet  Government 
was  recorded  by  New  Ireland,  a  Sinn  Fein  pa- 
per, and  urged  as  a  reason  for  his  selection  as 
candidate  for  South  Armagh : 

"Dr.  McCartan  is  imprisoned  in  America  for 
his  activities  as  a  worker  in  the  cause  of  Irish 
Eepublicanism.  He  went  to  America  as  an  ac- 
credited representative  of  the  movement.  We 
know  that  his  views  are  very  strong  upon  the 
importance  of  using  the  Eussian  democratic 
programme  for  the  benefit  of  Ireland,  and  of  al- 
lying ourselves  with  Eussian  democrats,  and 
with  real  democrats  throughout  the  world."  f 

*  Voice  of  Labour,  June  21st,  1919. 
f  New  Ireland,  January  26th,  1918. 


214      THE  BOLSHEVIK  ALLIANCE 

During  the  following  year  the  world  shud- 
dered at  the  infamies  of  Lenin  and  Trotzky  and 
their  Commissaries,  but  the  Bolshevik  enthusi- 
asm of  the  Sinn  Fein  ambassador  suffered  no 
abatement.  The  Soviet  Government  sent  an 
ambassador  to  America,  a  Mr.  L.  Martens,  who 
was  rapturously  greeted  by  the  Irish  revolution- 
aries. In  the  spring  of  1919  an  exchange  of 
notes  took  place  between  him  and  the  Irish  en- 
voy. The  circumstances  which  led  to  it  are  not 
without  interest.  A  story  was  going  the  round 
of  the  American  and  British  Press  that  the  So- 
viet Eepublic  was  subsidising  Sinn  Fein  to  the 
tune  of  some  millions  of  roubles.  The  moderate 
Sinn  Feiners  contradicted  the  assertion  and  took 
occasion  to  express  disapproval  of  the  Soviet 
methods.  This  would  seem  to  have  given  pain 
to  Mr.  Martens,  for  he  straightway  addressed  a 
letter  to  Dr.  McCartan  asking  whether  these 
sentiments  were  shared  by  his  government, 
and  incidentally  denying  that  the  Bussian  Ee- 
public had  sent  any  funds  to  Sinn  Fein. 

In  his  reply  Dr.  McCartan  disclaimed  the  au- 
thorship of  the  report  about  the  subsidies,  and 
with  regard  to  the  more  important  query  said : 

"The  4,000,000  people  of  the  Eepublic  of  Ire- 
land, in  their  struggle  to  free  themselves  from 
military  subjugation  by  an  Empire  of  400,000,- 
000,  want  and  welcome  the  aid  of  all  free  men,  of 


THE  COMPACT  WITH  BOLSHEVISM    215 

all  free  peoples,  and,  certainly,  of  the  free  men 
of  the  Russian  Socialist  Federated  Soviet  Re- 
public. ' ' 

He  then  proceeds  to  say  that  the  Irish  people 
do  not  believe  the  account  of  Soviet  rule  retailed 
by  the  Northcliffe  Press,  nor  the  stories  of 
Soviet  outrages  told  by  the  British  Government, 
which  was  itself  participating  in  the  butcheries 
of  Koltchak,  Denikin,  and  Mannerheim,  and 
then  he  thus  concludes : 

"  Hence,  between  the  gallant,  starving,  iso- 
lated Russians  striving  against  alien  enemies  to 
found  securely  in  Russia  a  government  of  the 
people,  by  the  people,  for  the  people,  and  the 
Irish  also  isolated  in  their  struggle  against 
British  armies  of  occupation  to  found  securely 
the  Republic  of  Ireland,  there  can  exist  only 
that  sense  of  brotherhood  which  a  common  ex- 
perience endured  for  a  common  purpose  can 
alone  induce."  * 

These  assurances  would  appear  to  have  been 
entirely  satisfactory  to  Lenin,  for  in  June 
Tchitcherin,  the  Bolshevik  Foreign  Minister, 
sent  a  radio  message  to  Bela  Kun,  which  was 
published  by  L'Humanite  on  June  16th.  The 
message  ran  thus: 

*  New  York  Call,  May  10th,  1919,  reprinted  in  the  Voice  of 
Labour,  June  21st.  The  same  issue  of  the  latter  paper  testifies 
to  the  sturdy  championship  of  the  Bolshevists  by  Liam  Mellowes. 


216      THE  BOLSHEVIK  ALLIANCE 

"Whereas  in  nearly  every  country  our  com- 
patriots have  neither  protection  nor  represen- 
tation, we  have  put  all  foreigners  in  the  same 
position,  and  we  will  afford  them  no  special  pro- 
tection. Exception  will  be  made,  however,  in 
the  case  of  the  Irish  and  the  Egyptians,  and 
of  any  other  nationality  oppressed  by  the  Al- 
lies." 

Mr.  Cathal  0' Shannon  remarks  that  "for 
this  special  mark  of  honour  both  Irish  and 
Egyptians  will  be  grateful  to  the  Soviet  Ee- 
public."  * 

We  shall  doubtless  be  assured,  as  we  were 
assured  in  respect  of  Germany,  that  there  is  no 
alliance  between  the  Soviet  Eepublic  and  the 
Eepublicans  of  Ireland.  Perhaps  not — why 
bandy  phrases  ? — but  there  is  a  very  substantial 
understanding.  It  is  abundantly  clear  that  the 
intellectual  and  idealistic  side  of  the  revolution- 
ary movement  had  surrendered  to  the  proleta- 
rian. There  are,  of  course,  some  who  view  this 
development  with  distrust  and  dislike,  among 
them  Mr.  O'Hegarty,  but  as  a  whole  Sinn  Fein 
has  obeyed  the  ordinary  law  of  revolutionary 
evolution  and  no  longer  controls  the  force  which 
it  set  in  motion. 

It  will  be  convenient  at  this  point  to  consider 
the  particular  causes  which  impel  Sinn  Fein 

*  Voice  of  Labour,  July  5th,  1919. 


THE  KISING  SUN  217 

willy-nilly  to  gravitate  towards  the  left,  over 
and  above  the  ordinary  revolutionary  tendency 
just  alluded  to.  There  is  first  the  belief  that 
Eussian  Communism  is  destined  to  triumph,  as 
set  forth  in  a  Sinn  Fein  paper : 

"  Their  ideas  are  in  the  ascendant  and 
against  them  mere  military  force  is  powerless. 
They  have  affected  Germany  deeply,  they  will 
certainly  affect  France,  Italy  will  follow  easily 
enough,  England  is  doubtful,  and  the  United 
States  will  remain  quite  impervious.  America 
will  have  only  American  democracy,  which  is 
merely  snobbery  and  conceit  under  another 
name."* 

Holding  this  faith,  Sinn  Fein  sees  in  the 
spread  of  Bolshevism  through  Europe  an  em- 
barrassment for  Great  Britain  more  serious 
even  than  the  threats  of  German  militarism, 
and  all  the  more  serious  because  of  the  possibil- 
ity that  it  may  invade  Great  Britain,  as  no  Con- 
tinental Power  could  ever  do.  Sinn  Fein  has 
accordingly  been  impelled  to  enter  into  relations 
with  John  Maclean,  the  Bolshevik  Consul-Gen- 
eral  in  Glasgow,  and  the  Clyde  Committee.  Mes- 
sages passed  between  them  just  before  the  Gen- 
eral Election  giving  reciprocal  assurances  of 
co-operation  and  asseverating  the  harmony  of 
their  respective  aims. 

*  New  Ireland,  January  12th,  1918. 


218      THE  BOLSHEVIK  ALLIANCE 

Next,  Sinn  Fein  has  to  consider  its  own  po- 
sition in  Ireland.  It  now  holds  seventy-three 
seats,  but  it  must  have  doubts  whether  it  will 
hold  as  many  at  the  next  General  Election. 
Some  of  them  it  owes  to  the  self-abnegation  of 
the  Labour  Party,  which  will  hardly  be  so  self- 
denying  on  the  next  occasion.  And  Labour  has 
been  growing  in  strength.  The  affiliated  mem- 
bership of  the  Irish  Trade  Union  and  Labour 
Party  Congress  in  1912  was  70,000;  in  1916  it 
had  risen  to  120,000;  in  1918  250  delegates 
claimed  to  represent  250,000  members,  while  be- 
tween 1916  and  1918  the  income  had  increased 
from  £410  to  £1,610.  Labour  is  therefore  a  thing 
to  be  reckoned  with,  not  only  for  its  voting 
strength  but  as  a  field  for  recruiting. 

And  there  is  this  further  consideration  which 
can  hardly  be  absent  from  the  calculations  of 
De  Valera.  In  all  countries  the  rural  population 
is  the  last  to  catch  the  fever  of  revolution.  In 
Ireland  the  change  from  tenancy  to  ownership 
is  bound  to  operate  as  an  additional  prophylac- 
tic against  infection.  Three  hundred  thousand 
agricultural  proprietors  have  been  created,  one 
hundred  thousand  more  have  entered  into  ar- 
rangements to  purchase,  and  all  of  them  on  easy 
terms  which  enable  them  to  resell  their  proper- 
ties at  a  large  profit.    These  men  are  not  inflam- 


DRIVEN  BY  THE  FURIES         219 

mable  material,  nor  are  the  dealings  of  the 
Soviet  Republic  with  the  peasantry  of  Russia 
likely  to  arouse  their  enthusiasm — when  they 
get  to  know  them.  Sinn  Fein  is  therefore 
thrown  back  perforce  on  the  urban  population, 
where  revolutionary  Labour  is  in  the  ascendant. 
Such  a  combination  of  forces  compels  Sinn  Fein 
to  accept  the  alliance,  much  as  some  of  its  mem- 
bers may  mistrust  it,  of  the  Bolshevik  element 
in  the  revolutionary  movement. 

"Were  the  revolutionaries  to  achieve  their  ob- 
ject, it  is  probable  that  the  new  Irish  Republic 
would  be  the  theatre  of  a  sanguinary  struggle 
between  the  constructive  and  destructive  wings 
of  the  movement.  But  until  that  moment  Sinn 
Fein  ignores  the  probable  catastrophe  of  the 
future  in  order  to  win  the  possible  triumph  of 
the  present.  Indeed,  it  is  compelled  to  ignore  it. 
It  is  being  driven  headlong  by  furies  of  its  own 
creation  into  paths  which,  most  likely,  it  never 
contemplated  ten,  or  even  five,  years  ago.  It 
has  proclaimed  a  Republic,  elected  a  President, 
nominated  its  envoys,  established  its  Parlia- 
ment. To  descend  from  such  altitudes  to  an  ac- 
ceptance of  local  self-government  would  be  sui- 
cide. It  would  perish  under  the  ridicule  of  the 
world  and  the  execrations  of  the  people  it  has 
deceived.   Not  one  man  of  its  leaders  would  ever 


220      THE  BOLSHEVIK  ALLIANCE 

again  have  a  place  in  the  public  life  of  Ireland, 
for  Great  Britain  conld  never  trust  the  word  of 
men  who  formed  alliances  with  Germany  and 
avowed  their  desire  to  destroy  her  in  the  hour 
of  her  sorest  need. 

Sinn  Fein,  therefore,  must  go  forward  be- 
cause it  cannot  go  back.  But  it  cannot  go  for- 
ward alone,  it  must  have  an  ally.  Where  is 
one  to  be  found?  France,  to  whom  revolution- 
ary Ireland  was  wont  to  look,  turns  her  back  on 
her  to-day.  America  may  express  a  platonic  de- 
sire to  see  the  Irish  question  settled,  and  even 
settled  on  broad  lines,  but  Sinn  Fein  knows  in 
its  heart  that  neither  America,  nor  any  other 
Power  in  friendship  with  Great  Britain,  would 
formulate  or  support  a  demand  that  she  should 
concede  independence  to  Ireland,  when  the  very 
men  who  demand  it  have  proclaimed  that  the 
loss  of  Ireland  means  the  loss  of  her  place  in  the 
world.  So  fully  does  Sinn  Fein  realise  that  fact 
that  already  they  are  exchanging  the  language 
of  appeal  and  flattery  for  the  language  of  men- 
ace to  the  United  States. 

To  what,  then,  can  Sinn  Fein  turn  for  assist- 
ance other  than  the  revolutionary  movement 
which  knows  neither  boundaries,  nor  interna- 
tional obligations,  nor  scruples,  and  which  itself 
is  using  every  device,  however  disgraceful,  to 


SINN  FEIN  PEO-DEVIL  221 

gain  adherents  wherever  it  can  find  them? 
Were  the  position  thus  nakedly  presented  to 
some  leaders  of  Sinn  Fein,  they  would  repudi- 
ate it,  though  there  are  many  that  would  not — 
Mr.  Walsh,  for  instance,  the  member  for  Cork 
City,  who  said  at  Blackpool  that  "if  the  devil 
himself  and  all  the  devils  in  hell  were  up  against 
the  British  Government  the  Irish  people  would 
be  pro-devil  and  pro-hell. ' '  *  But  they  comfort- 
ably blind  themselves  to  it  when  they  enter 
into  relations  with  the  extreme  Labour  Party. 

Mr.  de  Blacam  states  the  case  very  clearly  in 
the  following  passage : 

' '  In  the  great  national  boycott  of  the  English 
language,  English  manufactures,  English  insti- 
tutions, Labour  will  play  a  large — perhaps  the 
largest — part.  Labour  has  practical  work  be- 
fore it  no  less  than  Sinn  Fein.  Neither  is  a 
mere  agitation  nor  a  theory  turned  into  a  party. 
Sinn  Fein  is  the  nation's  expression  of  its  iden- 
tity and  right  to  self-determination,  and  its  man- 
date does  not  authorise  it  to  declare  for  any 
specific  programme  save  in  so  far  as  that  pro- 
gramme proves  to  be  the  out-working  of  the 
self-determining  nation.  Once  in  history  Capi- 
tal stood  for  liberty.  In  the  Polish  war  against 
Eussia  a  hundred  odd  years  ago,  the  capitalists 

*  Irish   Times,  December   11th,   1918. 


222      THE  BOLSHEVIK  ALLIANCE 

i — Jewish  bankers — of  Poland  cast  in  their  lot 
with  the  weaker  side.  Were  the  wonder  to  be  re- 
peated, and  were  Irish  capitalists  to  stand  in 
with  the  nation,  Sinn  Fein  would  accept  their 
aid.  But  Irish  patriotism  has  proved  to  be  sole- 
ly resident  in  the  democracy,  and  Labour  is  the 
only  party  which  has  waived  its  private  aims 
for  the  national  cause.  In  the  Labour  move- 
ment, harmonising  as  it  does  with  reviving  Gael- 
icism,  we  see  the  nation  determining  itself.  Sinn 
Fein,  that  asks  all  citizens  to  work  for  Ireland 
in  their  individual  ways,  is  by  its  principles  and 
nature  bound  to  sanction  the  patriotic  endeav- 
ours of  the  Labour  Party,  and  to  use  the  weap- 
ons which  a  truly  national  body  places  in  its 
hands.  By  sheer  force  of  patriotism,  the  La- 
bour Party  is  engrossing  political  power,  and  by 
forming — let  us  not  say  the  workers  but,  what  is 
synonymous,  the  nation — into  '  One  Big  Union, ' 
it  is  forging  the  most  powerful  weapon  ever  held 
by  the  Gael.  Before  the  united  action  of  the  One 
Big  Union,  English  capitalism,  and  with  it  Eng- 
lish political  power,  are  to  be  rendered  im- 
potent. The  one-day  anti-conscription  strike 
showed  how  a  nation,  wakened  by  Labour  to  a 
sense  of  its  economic  solidarity,  even  though  de- 
prived of  political  power,  can  assert  its  will.,,  * 

*  Towards  the  Republic,  Chap.  VI. 


SINN  FEIN  AND  SOVIETS         223 

And  this  is  how  the  Labour  Party  puts  it : 
""The  Eussian  Government  was  the  only  Gov- 
ernment that  had  sincerely  and  whole-heartedly 
called  for  the  self-determination  of  Ireland. 
Their  British  Government  had  not  done  it  be- 
cause it  was  capitalist.  Their  Yankee  Govern- 
ment had  not  done  it  because  it  was  capitalist. 
The  German  Government  had  not  done  it  be- 
cause it  was  capitalist  too. ' '  * 

It  would  not  be  difficult  to  quote  declara- 
tions by  leaders  of  Sinn  Fein  which  show  how 
far  it  has  moved  towards  the  ideals  of  Eevolu- 
tionary  Labour.  The  Countess  Markievics,  who 
is  a  member  of  Dail  Eireann  and  of  the  Su- 
preme Grand  Council,  has  openly  declared  for 
Soviet  Government  and  the  disfranchisement  of 
all  non-workers.  Mr.  Figgis,  who  is  one  of  the 
Secretaries  of  the  Grand  Council  of  Sinn  Fein, 
depicts  a  somewhat  similar  constitutional  evo- 
lution : 

"Just  as  in  the  old  State  each  council  held 
authority  in  its  own  concerns,  leaving  to  the 
monarch  the  co-ordination  of  the  whole,  so  the 
modern  councils  would  each  rule  their  own  af- 
fairs, subject  to  the  control  of  the  Assembly  of 
the  Nation.    There  would  thus  be  two  kinds  of 

*Mr.  Cathal  O 'Shannon,  Irish  Labour  Congress,  November 
1st,  1918. 


224      THE  BOLSHEVIK  ALLIANCE 

representations  gathered  together,  the  direct 
representation  of  the  nation,  and  there  would  he 
the  special  representation  of  the  interests,  the 
union  and  pattern  of  which  create  the  national 
life.    Both  wonld  meet  in  the  Government. ' '  * 

Here  we  see,  and  not  dimly,  the  Soviet  idea, 
the  Soldiers y  and  Sailors'  Councils,  and  all  the 
rest  of  the  Bolshevist  machinery,  which,  as  has 
been  recorded,  were  adumbrated  by  James  Con- 
nolly a  few  years  earlier. 

It  is,  therefore,  abundantly  clear  that  whether 
by  conviction  or  compulsion,  Sinn  Fein  and  La- 
bour must  be  regarded  as  a  single  entity  for 
the  purpose  of  its  revolutionary  enterprise 
against  Great  Britain.  Mr.  Eoberf  Smillie 
showed  his  grasp  of  realities  when  he  called  for 
a  strong  representation  of  Labour  in  Parlia- 
ment on  the  ground  that  there  would  then  be 
some  inducement  for  Sinn  Fein  to  go  to  "that 
accursed  reactionary  chamber."  For  then  a 
bargain  might  be  made  on  the  basis  of  "Your 
fight  is  our  fight,  come  over  and  help  us."  f 

That  Mr.  Smillie  's  words  did  not  receive  more 
attention  when  they  were  spoken  must  be 
ascribed  partly  to  the  delirium  of  the  recent  vic- 
tory, partly  to  the  preoccupation  of  the  coming 

*  The  Gaelic  State  in  the  Past  and  Future.  The  italics  are 
ours. 

t  At  Glasgow,  December  6th,  1918. 


IRISH  LABOUR'S  PROGRAMME    225 

elections,  and  in  larger  degree  to  an  inadequate 
appreciation  of  the  realities  of  the  Irish  situa- 
tion. For  if  they  be  considered  coolly  and  with 
detachment  they  are  full  of  significance.  Let 
us  review  the  facts  of  the  position. 

In  Ireland  there  is  a  dual  alliance  between  a 
party  seeking  political  independence  by  revolu- 
tionary methods  and  a  party  seeking  national 
independence,  not  only  for  its  own  sake,  but  as 
the  prelude  to  the  establishment  of  a  Workers ' 
Republic  on  the  Russian  model. 

"To  win  for  the  workers  of  Ireland,  collec- 
tively, the  ownership  and  control  of  the  whole 
produce  of  their  labour. 

"To  secure  the  democratic  management  and 
control  of  all  industries  and  services  by  the 
whole  body  of  workers,  manual  and  mental,  en- 
gaged therein,  in  the  interest  of  the  nation  and 
subject  to  the  supreme  authority  of  the  national 
Government. ' '  * 

Between  the  revolutionary  parties  thus  co- 
operating in  Ireland  and  the  Russian  Soviet 
Republic  there  is  an  understanding  as  close  and 
intimate  as  there  was  with  Germany,  an  under- 
standing thus  described  by  the  Countess  Mar- 
kievics : 

*  Objects  and  methods  of  the  Irish  Labour  Party  and  Trade 
Union  Congress.    See  2b  and  c. 


226      THE  BOLSHEVIK  ALLIANCE 

"We  have  a  treaty  with  Germany,  the  treaty 
Casement  promoted.  At  the  end  of  the  war,  if 
Germany  is  strong  enough,  she  will  make  Ire- 
land a  free  and  independent  Eepnblic ;  and  Case- 
ment gave  an  assurance  that  Ireland  would  be 
true  to  her  deliverers. ' '  * 

All  these  formalities  have  been  observed  in 
the  arrangement  between  the  Irish  revolution- 
ary parties  and  the  Bolshevik  Government.  Dr. 
McCartan  has  plighted  the  faith  of  Sinn  Fein. 
The  delegates  of  the  Labour  Party  have  waited 
upon  and  exchanged  fraternal  greetings  with 
Tchitcherin  and  Litvinoff,  and  have  sealed  the 
compact  in  the  following  passage  of  a  state- 
ment on  the  international  situation,  unanimous- 
ly adopted  by  the  Irish  Labour  Party  and 
Trades  Union  Congress : 

"Finally,  and  true  to  its  tradition  for  liberty, 
for  internationalism,  for  the  fraternity  of  the 
working-class  of  every  land  and  for  the  Eepub- 
lic  of  the  Workers,  Irish  Labour  utters  its  ve- 
hement protest  against  the  capitalist  outlawry 
of  the  Soviet  Eepublic  of  Eussia,  and  calls  upon 
the  workers  under  the  Governments  sharing  in 
this  crime  to  compel  the  evacuation  of  the  Ee- 
public, at  the  same  time  as  it  renews  its  welcome 
and  congratulations  to  its  Eussian  comrades 

*  Speech  in  East  Tyrone,  April  2nd,  1918. 


SMILLIE  BACKS  SINN  FEIN       227 

who  for  twelve  months  have  exercised  that  po- 
litical, social,  and  economic  freedom  towards 
which  Irish  workers  in  common  with  their  fel- 
lows in  other  lands  still  strive  and  aspire.9'  * 

The  Soviet  Government  on  its  side,  through 
Mr.  Litvinoff,  its  ambassador  to  England,  en- 
gaged to  support  Ireland's  admission  to  the  In- 
ternational as  a  nation.  In  making  this  prom- 
ise Mr.  Litvinoff,  who  is  said  to  have  been  well 
informed  about  Irish  affairs,  said  that  James 
Connolly's  name  was  favourably  known  to  the 
Eussian  Revolutionary  Movement.f 

These  allies  have  an  understanding,  or  com- 
pact— the  exact  word  is  immaterial — with  the 
revolutionary  section  of  British  Labour,  the 
party  of  direct  action.  Mr.  Smillie  has  pro- 
claimed that  he  is  willing  to  see  Ireland  estab- 
lished as  an  independent  Republic  in  return  for 
the  assistance  of  Sinn  Fein  in  the  promotion  of 
his  theories.  * '  Your  fight  is  our  fight,  come  over 
and  help  us."  There  is  indeed  an  obstacle  to 
this  plan  of  campaign — the  Sinn  Fein  vow  of 
abstention  from  parliamentary  action.  But  Mr. 
Smillie,  conscious  that  this  vow  might  be  re- 
tracted were  revolutionary  Labour  represented 

*  November  1st,  1918.  From  Report  published  by  the  au- 
thority of  the  executive.     The  italics  are  ours. 

t  Report  by  D.  R.  Campbell  and  William  O'Brien,  Trades 
Union  Congress,  August  5th,  1918. 


228      THE  BOLSHEVIK  ALLIANCE 

in  Parliament  by  two  hundred  and  fifty  men  like 
himself  or  Mr.  John  Maclean  or  Mr.  Eobert 
"Williams,  holds  out  the  active  co-operation  of 
Sinn  Fein  as  an  inducement  to  the  electorate 
to  support  him  and  his  friends. 

Meanwhile,  pending  the  electoral  triumph  for 
which  he  hopes  and  works,  the  work  of  the  allies 
is  being  carried  on  in  the  extra-Parliamentary 
field.  The  British  extremists  threaten  the  stop- 
page of  British  trade  and  industry  in  the  inter- 
ests of  Bolshevist  Eussia,  as  witness  the  words 
of  Mr.  John  Maclean  in  the  Call  of  January, 
1910.  Declaring  that  "  Bolshevism  is  Socialism 
triumphant, ' '  he  proclaims  it  to  be  the  duty  of 
British  revolutionary  Socialists  to  hamper  any 
attempts  to  impede  its  progress  "by  develop- 
ing the  revolution  in  Britain  not  later  than  this 
year. ' ' 

The  Soviet  Bepublic  despatches  its  emissaries 
to  England,  sets  its  printing  presses  to  work 
striking  off  forged  notes  to  dislocate  British 
currency;  and  Bussian  roubles,  not  forged  nor 
in  the  form  of  roubles,  find  their  way  to  the 
revolutionary  treasury. 

And  Sinn  Fein  "does  its  bit"  by  keeping  Ire- 
land in  a  ferment,  and  watches  events  in  Great 
Britain  in  order  to  seize  its  opportunity. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

A  STATE   OF   WAR 

With  the  signing  of  the  armistice  a  wave  of  so- 
cial unrest  and  discontent  swept  over  the  conn- 
try.  Snch  a  phenomenon  is  one  of  the  sequelae 
of  all  great  wars,  though  perhaps  seldom  has  it 
been  so  widespread  and  intense.  Practically  the 
whole  industrial  as  well  as  the  military  strength 
of  the  nation  had  been  mobilised,  whence  it  came 
that  there  was  no  class  of  the  workers  left  un- 
affected by  uneasiness  and  uncertainty  as  to  its 
future  conditions.  Add  to  this  the  prolonged 
tension  of  the  war,  the  excessive  strain  of 
effort  which  it  had  demanded,  and  the  disturb- 
ance of  economic  condition  which  it  had  caused, 
and  it  becomes  easy  to  understand  and  condone 
a  certain  petulance  and  unreason  among  those 
whose  work  had  come  to  a  sudden  end. 

There  were,  however,  elements  in  society 
which  resolved  to  play  upon  this  temper  for 
their  own  ends.    The  pacifist  cranks,  the  folk 

229 


230  A  STATE  OF  WAE 

who  boasted  that  "they  had  no  country' *  and 
during  the  war  had  proved  it  by  siding  with  a 
foreign  country  against  their  own,  people  of  a 
baser  sort  who  had  hired  themselves  to  the  ene- 
my, agitators  who  lived  by  disorder,  all  saw  a 
chance  and  proceeded  to  take  it.  German  agents 
also  saw  their  chance  and  proceeded  to  take  it. 
There  were  many  things  in  the  great  war  that 
astounded  the  minds  of  men  and  racked  their 
nerves,  but  nothing  was  more  astonishing  or 
nerve-racking  than  the  cobweb  of  intrigue,  spun 
by  a  hidden  hand,  in  which  the  nation  was  en- 
meshed, and  in  which  it  felt  itself  entangled  at 
every  crisis.  Its  most  formidable  and  baffling 
manifestations  occurred  in  connection  with  La- 
bour. We  have  already  seen  how  Baron  Von 
Horst  was  subscribing  liberally  to  support  a 
great  strike  in  the  years  before  the  war,  and  in 
similar  manner  during  the  war  enemy  agents 
were  at  work  fomenting  disaffection  and  pro- 
moting trouble  in  the  factories  and  shipyards. 
The  rank  and  file  did  not  know  it,  they  were  un- 
suspecting tools.  There  were  men  higher  up 
who  knew  it,  and  who  talked  of  the  rights  of  the 
workers  while  they  were  thinking  of  the  inter- 
ests of  Germany.  The  process  was  not  confined 
to  Great  Britain.  In  America  Count  Bernstorff 
was  plotting  sabotage  with  reliable  agents;  iu 


"SAVE  RUSSIA"  231 

Mexico  the  German  Minister  was  stirring  up 
trouble  on  the  oilfields;  while  in  Spain  Prince 
Ratibor's  efforts  to  promote  strikes  in  the  great 
mines  evoked  open  denunciations  in  the  Spanish 
Press.  A  careful  study  of  the  war  will  show  a 
singular  coincidence  between  industrial  troubles 
in  Allied  or  neutral  countries  and  the  contempo- 
raneous interests  of  Germany. 

So  too  when  Germany  fell.  Her  intrigues 
had  failed  to  save  her  from  falling,  but  they 
might  yet  serve  to  mitigate  the  effects  of  the 
fall.  The  engine  was  put  in  motion  once  more.  A 
certain  section  in  Great  Britain  made  lofty  ap- 
peals for  generosity  to  the  conquered  in  public, 
while  in  private  they  fomented  a  disorder  that 
would  enforce  their  open  teaching.  Further 
to  create  embarrassment,  they  proceeded  to  stir 
up  revolt  in  order  to  preserve  the  existence  of 
the  Eussian  Soviet  Government.  It  mattered 
nothing  that  that  Government  itself  officially  ad- 
mitted that  its  executions  were  numbered  by 
thousands,  and  that  its  own  laws  condemned  mil- 
lions to  a  slow  death  from  inanition.  "With- 
draw from  Russia  "  became  the  battle-cry  of  the 
revolutionaries. 

Professing  a  pure  democracy,  these  extreme 
democrats  proceeded  to  abjure  their  own  faith. 
"If  the  Coalition  Government  be  returned/ ' 
roared  Mr.  Smillie,  "I  will  use  my  influence  to 


232  A  STATE  OF  WAR 

make  the  position  of  the  Government  unten- 
able." The  London  Workers'  Committee,  to 
whom  the  assurance  was  given,  hailed  it  with 
rapture,  and  pointed  out  to  Mr.  Smillie  that  he 
could  best  effect  his  purpose  by  bringing  about 
a  general  stoppage  of  the  mining  industry  as  a 
protest  against  "the  violation  of  Russia."  * 

Mr.  George  Lansbury  outlined  a  similar  plan 
of  campaign:  "If  the  Coalition  wins  ...  it 
will  be  the  first  duty  of  Labour  ...  to  put  a 
term  to  the  life  of  this  Parliament.  .  .  .  The 
Constitution  provides  no  remedy.  Very  well, 
then;  we  must  seek  one  outside  the  Constitution. 
If  we  cannot  persuade  the  Government,  we  shall 
have  to  coerce  it.  And  we  have  the  means.  .  .  . 
We  must  use  our  industrial  power  to  regain  our 
political  liberty. ' '  f 

It  is  noteworthy  that  this  threat  was  made 
before  ever  the  new  Parliament  was  elected,  and 
that  Mr.  Lansbury  and  his  colleagues  were 
prominent  in  their  attempts  to  secure  the  most 
favourable  terms  for  Germany. 

The  principal  efforts  of  the  revolutionaries 
were  directed  towards  promoting  revolt  among 
the  workers  against  their  authorised  leaders. 

*  Article  in  the  Workers'  Dreadnought,  by  W.  F.  Watson, 
President  of  the  London  Workers'  Committee.  Quoted  in  the 
Morning  Post,  January  10th,  1919. 

t  The  Herald,  Dec.  21st,  1918. 


IRELAND  AT  BERNE  233 

Their  policy  and  its  results  are  thus  described 
by  Mr.  Jack  Jones,  a  Labour  Member  whose 
principles  are  of  a  robust  type: 

1 '  Some  of  the  principal  leaders  of  the  unoffi- 
cial strikes  now  taking  place  were  well-known 
anarchists,  who  were  striving  in  every  way  to 
discredit  organised  political  action,  and  if  the 
workers  of  this  country  were  prepared  to  follow 
their  teaching,  there  would  be  reproduced  here 
the  trials  and  tribulations  of  the  Russian  and 
German  peoples.' '  * 

Such  forebodings  fell  like  sweet  music  on  the 
ears  of  the  Irish  Republicans.  Already  they  had 
begun  to  make  ready  to  take  the  tide  of  social 
and  industrial  unrest  at  the  flood.  Early  in 
November  the  Irish  Labour  Party  had  met ;  as- 
serted the  principle  of  national  independence, 
and  drawn  up  a  constitution  on  the  Soviet  mod- 
el. In  the  same  month  in  which  Mr.  Jones 
sounded  his  note  of  warning  Mr.  Cathal  0  'Shan- 
non and  Mr.  Thomas  Johnson  were  pleading  the 
cause  of  Ireland  at  the  International  Labour 
and  Socialist  Conference  at  Berne,  urging  her 
claim  to  be  admitted  to  the  International  as  a 
national  unit,  expressing  "a  fervent  hope  that 
the  Bolshevik  Revolution  would  uphold  the 
purity  of  its  noble  principles  against  all  its  ene- 

*  Morning  Post,  February  7th,   1919. 


234  A  STATE  OF  WAE 

mies,"  and  declaring  "the  people  of  Dublin  to 
be  at  one  with  the  people  of  Russia  in  accepting 
the  programme  of  the  Revolution. ' '  * 

"While  Labour  was  thus  consolidating  the  po- 
sition of  the  Irish  Republic  abroad,  Sinn  Fein 
was  preparing  for  its  establishment  by  force  at 
home.  It  may  seem  curious  that  Sinn  Fein 
should  be  planning  another  rising  at  the  same 
time  that  it  was  proclaiming  its  confidence  that 
the  Peace  Conference  would  give  Ireland  her 
independence.  But  in  fact  that  confidence  was 
largely  assumed.  In  their  hearts  De  Valera  and 
his  colleagues  must  have  nursed  uneasy  doubts 
whether  they  could  make  good  the  promises 
wherewith  they  had  swept  the  constituencies. 
Boldly  as  they  might  cite  the  cases  of  Poland, 
Czecho-Slovakia,  and  Jugo-Slavia,  old  and  de- 
crepit organisms  now  emerging  from  Medea's 
cauldron  in  youthful  vigour,  on  their  own  be- 
half, they  must  have  known  that  the  parallelism 
between  them  was  defective.  They  must  have 
known  that  they  had  not  a  friend  at  Paris — not 
America,  whose  hospitality  Ireland  had  abused; 
not  Belgium,  to  whom  Ireland  had  given  a  hos- 
pitality not  distinguishable  from  hostility;  not 
even  Poland,  nor  Czecho-Slovakia,  nor  Serbia, 

*  Official  Keport  of  Berne  Conference.  Published  by  the 
Irish  Labour  Party. 


LOOKING  TOWAEDS  ENGLAND   235 

on  the  side  of  whose  mortal  foes  Ireland  had 
ranged  herself.  Sinn  Fein  had  obtained  a 
pledge  that  Germany  would  represent  its  inter- 
ests at  the  Conference,  but  when  it  became  ap- 
parent that  Germany  was  to  have  no  voice  in 
the  deliberations  the  pledge  became  valueless, 
and  Ireland  was  left  without  a  champion. 

In  these  dismal  circumstances  the  labour 
troubles  in  Great  Britain  offered  Sinn  Fein  an 
alternative  road  to  success,  and  one  moreover 
that,  with  good  luck,  might  not  be  extraordina- 
rily difficult.  The  Eepublicans  placed  their 
faith  in  the  Triple  Labour  Alliance  of  Great 
Britain.  The  attitude  of  the  railwaymen,  min- 
ers, and  transport  workers  was  full  of  menace. 
If  it  should,  as  seemed  not  unlikely,  develop 
into  action,  many  of  the  obstacles  to  rebellion 
would  be  removed. 

Such  a  strike,  by  stopping  locomotion,  would 
paralyse  the  military  forces,  and  would  localise 
military  operations  to  the  great  advantage  of 
the  insurgents.  It  was,  indeed,  by  no  means  cer- 
tain that  the  unwitting  aid  of  the  ' '  Big  Three ' ' 
would  not  be  more  valuable  to  the  Eepublicans 
than  the  assistance  which  Germany  had  been 
willing  to  give.  To  encourage  the  restless  work- 
ers in  Great  Britain  a  strike  was  precipitated 
in  Belfast  by  the  Labour  section  of  the  Eepubli- 


236  A  STATE  OF  WAR 

can  party,  while  Sinn  Fein  with  feverish  energy 
resumed  its  preparations  for  a  military  cam- 
paign. 

Immediately  after  the  General  Election  Sinn 
Fein  proceeded  to  exploit  the  mandate  of  the 
constituencies.  On  January  4th  Dr.  Patrick 
McCartan,  under  the  style  and  title  of  Envoy 
of  the  Provisional  Irish  Government,  notified 
all  the  Embassies  and  Legations  at  Washington 
that  Ireland  had  severed  political  relations  with 
Great  Britain  on  December  28th.*  Thereafter 
the  Republicans  proclaimed  that  a  state  of  war 
existed  between  Great  Britain  and  Ireland,  de- 
scribing the  military  forces  of  the  Crown  as  the 
Army  of  Occupation.  Thus  it  is  proclaimed  in 
An  Toglac,  a,  newspaper  printed  and  circulated 
secretly  and  widely  through  Ireland : 

"It  is  the  will  of  Ireland,  expressed  by  her 
responsible  Government,  that  a  state  of  war 
shall  be  perpetuated  in  this  country  until  the 
foreign  garrison  have  evacuated  our  country.  It 
will  be  the  duty  of  the  Volunteers,  acting  in  ac- 
cordance with  the  will  of  our  Government  and 
the  wishes  of  the  Irish  people,  to  secure  the 
continuance  of  that  state  of  war  by  every  means 
at  our  disposal,  and  in  the  most  vigorous  way 
practicable.    Every  Volunteer  must  be  prepared 

*  Wireless  Press   telegram   from   New  York,   January  4th: 
Morning  Post,  January  6th,  1919. 


SIGNS  OF  THE  TIMES  237 

for  more  drastic  action,  more  strenuous  activi- 
ties, than  ever  before  since  Easter,  1916.  As 
has  several  times  been  stated  before,  Volunteer 
officers  must  contemplate  the  possibilities  of  of- 
fensive as  well  as  defensive  action. "  * 

In  the  face  of  this  declaration  of  war  the  bit- 
ter protests  of  the  Eepublicans  against  the  em- 
ployment of  the  military  forces  in  Ireland  ap- 
pear lacking  both  in  logic  and  in  that  sense  of 
humour  with  which  the  Irish  race  is  generally 
credited.  "Whatever  may  be  said  against  mili- 
tary intervention  in  civil  troubles,  there  can  be 
no  question  that  soldiers  are  in  their  proper  ele- 
ment in  a  state  of  war. 

The  history  of  Ireland  can  at  all  periods  be 
pretty  accurately  followed  through  its  criminal 
records.  Analyse  the  activities  of  the  White 
Boys,  the  Eibbonmen,  the  Land  League,  and  the 
cattle-drivers,  and  it  is  possible  to  gauge  with 
considerable  exactitude  the  economic  problems 
of  their  respective  eras.  And  so  with  the  his- 
tory of  the  last  year.  The  breaches  of  the  law, 
and  they  were  terribly  numerous,  proclaim  the 
purpose  of  their  authors  with  astonishing  can- 
dour, and  that  purpose  was  civil  war.  Of  the 
old  agrarian  outrage  there  is  little ;  instead,  we 

*  Lord  Chancellor  7s  speech,  House  of  Lords,  April  14th, 
1919. 


238  A  STATE  OF  WAR 

read  of  raids  for  arms  and  explosives,  and  of 
plans  and  methods  for  rebellion.  Thus,  Charles 
Hurley,  who  was  tried  by  court-martial  at  Cork 
on  December  17th,  1918,  had  in  his  possession 
plans  for  the  destruction  of  the  police-barracks 
and  post  office  at  Castletown,  Berehaven,  as  well 
as  of  the  pier  at  that  place  where  the  British- 
American  stores  were  housed.  He  also  had 
plans  for  the  destruction  of  roads  and  bridges 
leading  to  that  important  centre  by  gelignite 
and  sulphine  bombs.  Michael  Hoey,  tried  by 
court-martial  at  Galway  on  March  25th,  was  in 
possession  of  documents  describing  the  best 
method  of  destroying  railways  and  telegraphs 
and  of  instructions  for  mining  bridges  and  for 
attacking  police-barracks. 

There  were  numerous  cases  of  attacks  on  po- 
lice-barracks, houses,  and  individuals,  all  with 
the  single  object  of  capturing  weapons  and  ex- 
plosives. In  the  middle  of  February  a  body  of 
men  boarded  a  ship  at  Cork,  and  searched  it  for 
arms,  by  authority  of  ' '  a  warrant  from  the  Irish 
Republican  Army. ' '  An  aerodrome  at  Collins- 
town,  Co.  Dublin,  was  attacked  in  the  night 
about  March  20th  and  eighty  service  rifles  were 
carried  off.  Explosives  were  especially  in  de- 
mand, it  being  naturally  the  first  object  of  the 
Republican  tacticians  to  destroy  all  ways  of 


THE  TIPPEEAEY  OUTEAGE       239 

communication.  One  of  these  enterprises  de- 
serves particular  attention,  both  as  being  typical 
of  the  methods  of  Sinn  Fein  and  because  of  its 
consequences. 

By  a  happy  coincidence,  just  as  Sinn  Fein 
was  urgently  searching  for  explosives,  the  Tip- 
perary  County  Council  requested  the  Govern- 
ment to  provide  it  with  a  considerable  quantity 
of  gelignite  for  some  blasting  operations.  The 
gelignite  was  sent  from  the  store  in  Tipperary 
in  the  Council's  carts,  under  convoy  of  two  po- 
licemen, on  January  20th.  The  Sinn  Feiners 
were  evidently  apprised  of  the  arrangements, 
for  the  convoy  was  attacked  at  Sologhead,  a  mile 
or  two  out  of  the  town,  by  a  party  of  men  who 
promptly  shot  both  constables  dead  and  cap- 
tured the  gelignite,  leaving  the  Council's  em- 
ployers unharmed  to  carry  the  news  back  to  Tip- 
perary. The  district  was  declared  a  military 
area,  an  act  which  has  been  denounced  as  bar- 
barous miltarism  by  the  very  men  who  glorify 
the  murder  of  the  constables  as  an  act  of  war. 
The  Eepublicans  replied  with  a  counter-procla- 
mation, which  is  given  in  full.  Lest  there  should 
be  any  doubt,  occasioned  by  its  amazing  charac- 
ter, of  the  official  origin  of  this  document,  it  may 
be  compared  with  a  speech  made  by  Mr.  Eoger 
Sweetman,  M.P.  for  North  Wexford,  at  Gorey 
on  January  5th: 


240  A  STATE  OF  WAR 

"Any  one  who  did  England's  dirty  work,  let 
him  be  lord-lieutenant,  judge,  or  policeman,  he 
would  tell  them  that  they  would  treat  them  as 
enemies  of  the  country  thenceforward."  * 

It  may  also  be  noted  that  thirty  copies  of 
this  Proclamation  were  found  in  the  possession 
of  Michael  Duggan,  a  Sinn  Feiner,  belonging  to 
County  Tipperary. 

' (  Proclamation. 

"  Whereas  a  foreign  and  tyrannical  Govern- 
ment is  preventing  Irishmen  exercising  the  civil 
right  of  buying  and  selling  in  their  own  mar- 
kets in  their  own  country,  and 

"Whereas  almost  every  Irishman  who  has 
suffered  the  death  penalty  for  Ireland  was  sen- 
tenced to  death  solely  on  the  strength  of  the 
evidence  and  reports  of  policemen,  who  there- 
fore are  dangerous  spies,  and 

"Whereas  the  thousands  of  Irishmen  who 
have  been  deported  and  sentenced  solely  on  the 
evidence  of  these  same  hirelings  and  assassins 
and  traitorous  spies,  the  police,  and 

"Whereas  the  life,  limb  and  living  of  no  citi- 
zen of  Ireland  is  safe  while  these  paid  spies  are 
allowed  to  infest  the  country,  and 

*  Freeman's  Journal,  January  7th,  1919. 


DECLAEATION  OF  WAE  241 

"Whereas  it  has  come  to  our  knowledge  that 
some  men  and  boys  have  been  arrested  and 
drugged,  and 

"  Whereas  there  are  few  Irishmen,  who  have 
sunk  to  such  depths  of  degradation,  that  they 
are  prepared  to  give  information  about  their 
neighbours  and  fellow  countrymen  to  the  police, 
and 

"Whereas  all  these  evils  will  continue  just  so 
long  as  the  people  permit: 

"We  hereby  proclaim  the  South  Kiding  of 
Tipperary  a  military  area  with  the  following 
regulations : 

"  (a)  A  policeman  found  within  the  said  area 

on  and  after  the  day  of  February,  1919, 

will  be  deemed  to  have  forfeited  his  life.  The 
more  notorious  police  being  dealt  with  as  far  as 
possible  first. 

"  (b)  On  and  after  the day  of  February, 

1919,  every  person  in  the  pay  of  England  (mag- 
istrates, jurors,  etc.)  who  helps  England  to  rule 
this  country  or  who  assists  in  any  way  the  up- 
holders of  the  foreign  Government  of  this  South 
Eiding  of  Tipperary  will  be  deemed  to  have  for- 
feited his  life. 

"(c)  Civilians  who  give  information  to  the 
police  or  soldiery,  especially  such  information 
as  is  of  a  serious  character,  if  convicted  will  be 
executed,  i.e.,  shot  or  hanged. 


242  A  STATE  OF  WAR 

"(d)  Police,  doctors,  prison  officials  who  as- 
sist at  or  who  countenance,  or  who  are  responsi- 
ble for,  or  who  are  in  any  way  connected  with 
the  drugging  of  an  Irish  citizen  for  the  purpose 
of  obtaining  information,  will  be  deemed  to  have 
forfeited  his  life,  and  may  be  hanged  or 
drowned,  or  shot  at  sight  as  a  common  outlaw. 
Offending  parties  will  be  executed  should  it 
take  years  to  track  them  down. 

"  (e)  Every  citizen  must  assist  when  required 
in  enabling  us  to  perform  our  duty. 

"By  Order.9' 

This  Proclamation  merits  particular  attention 
as  embodying  the  methods  by  which  the  Repub- 
lic of  Ireland  enforces  its  authority,  the  same 
methods  of  SchrecMichkeit  on  which  German 
militarism  relied  for  the  administration  of  Bel- 
gium. It  is  not  a  dead  letter,  a  mere  brutum 
fulmen,  a  thing  of  sound  and  fury  signifying 
nothing.  Its  warnings  have  been  fulfilled.  A 
County  Inspector  of  Constabulary  has  been 
murdered  while  altering  the  hands  of  his  clock 
to  summer  time;  the  Estate  Commissioners  in 
Clare  have  been  threatened  with  death  if  they 
allot  land  to  ex-soldiers ;  a  respectable  man  in 
County  Galway  has  had  his  house  fired  into  be- 
cause his  children  attended  a  school  which  was 


A  REIGN  OF  TERROR  243 

under  the  Republican  ban !  *  The  Countess 
Markievics  has  preached  the  boycotting  of  po- 
licemen's children;  constables  and  soldiers  are 
waylaid  and  attacked.  In  the  South  Riding  of 
Tipperary  itself,  since  the  proclamation  has 
been  issued,  two  constables  were  murdered  in  a 
train  at  Knocklong  Station  in  the  presence  of 
the  passengers  and  railway  officials,  and  the 
prisoner  in  their  custody  was  rescued.  District- 
Inspector  Hunt  was  shot  dead  in  the  crowded 
market  place  of  Thurles,  and  his  murderers 
walked  quietly  away  unmolested. 

The  agents  of  Sinn  Fein  always  are  unmo- 
lested. The  people  dare  not  speak  nor  jurors 
convict.  The  long  arm  of  Sinn  Fein  reaches 
everywhere  and  its  hand  is  laid  upon  the  na- 
tion's lips.  There  is  no  great  mystery  about 
these  deeds,  their  perpetrators  are  very  fre- 
quently well  known,  but  sympathy  or  fear  keeps 
men  silent. 

While  Sinn  Fein  was  thus  preparing  for 
armed  rebellion  in  anticipation  of  a  great  labour 
upheaval  in  Great  Britain,  the  left  wing  of  the 
Republican  party  was  busily  engaged  cement- 
ing the  Bolshevik  alliance  at  Berne,  promoting 
British  industrial  unrest  through  its  agents  in 

*  These  cases  were  mentioned  by  the  Chief  Secretary  for 
Ireland  in  the  House  of  Commons. 


244  A  STATE  OF  WAR 

England  and  Scotland,  and  promoting  serious 
labour  troubles  in  Belfast,  both  as  an  embar- 
rassment to  the  Irish  Government  and  as  an  en- 
couragement to  the  revolutionaries  on  the  other 
side  of  the  Channel.  Mr.  Thomas  Johnson  has 
set  forth  the  hopes  and  policy  of  the  Republi- 
cans with  commendable  frankness.  Explaining 
why  the  Limerick  strike  failed  and  was  bound 
to  fail,  he  yet  approved  it  because  "  there  were 
always  the  possibilities  or  probabilities  that  ag- 
gressive action  in  Ireland  might  prompt  aggres- 
sive action  on  the  other  side."  * 

Mr.  Bernard  Doyle  has  thus  expounded  the 
joint  plan  of  campaign  in  Dublin : 

"The  voice  of  the  Irish  people,  as  expressed 
at  the  polls,  had  given  them  authority  to  de- 
mand the  release  of  the  men  and  women  un- 
justly held  in  English  jails.  The  workers  of  Ire- 
land were  behind  them  and,  speaking  as  a  trade 
unionist,  he  was  glad  to  say  that  they  were  pre- 
pared to  '  down  tools '  at  any  minute  in  this  mat- 
ter at  the  command  of  the  Irish  Republic. ' '  f 

The  opportunity  presented  itself  some  three 
months  later.  There  was  in  Limerick  prison  a 
man  named  Byrne,  who  was  serving  a  term  of 

*  Speech  at  Irish  Trade  Congress.  Cork  Examiner,  August 
6th,  1919. 

t  Irish  Independent,  January  6th,  1919. 


THE  LIMEEICK  SOVIET  245 

hard  labour.  He  went  on  hunger  strike,  and  was 
removed  on  March  12th  to  the  hospital  of  the 
workhouse,  which  is  on  the  Clare  side  of  the 
river  Shannon.  Here  he  remained  for  some 
weeks  in  charge  of  a  prison  warder  and  an 
armed  body  of  Constabulary.  Saturday  is  the 
visiting  day  at  the  hospital  and  visitors  are  ad- 
mitted freely  between  1.30  and  3.30  p.  m.  On 
Saturday,  April  6th,  a  party  of  twenty  to  thirty 
men  rushed  into  the  ward  where  Byrne  was 
confined,  guarded  by  the  warder  and  five  police- 
men. A  fierce  revolver  duel  followed.  One  po- 
liceman was  killed,  another  dangerously  wound- 
ed, as  were  all  the  other  constables  and  the 
warder,  though  less  seriously.  The  rescue  party 
then  departed,  taking  with  them  Byrne,  who  had 
himself  been  wounded  in  the  fight,  and  whose 
dead  body  was  found  a  few  days  later  in  a  cot- 
tage a  couple  of  miles  distant. 

The  Government  met  this  "act  of  war"  by 
proclaiming  Limerick  a  military  area.  Under 
these  regulations  permits  were  required  to  en- 
ter or  leave  the  city,  and  it  therefore  became 
necessary  for  workers  who  lived  across  the 
river  to  obtain  passes  in  order  to  go  to  their 
work.  Such  permits  were  readily  obtainable, 
and  many  employers  obtained  them  for  their 
men.    But  this  did  not  suit  the  workers,  who 


246  A  STATE  OF  WAE 

saw  a  chance  of  striking  a  blow  in  support  of 
Sinn  Fein.  A  general  strike  was  proclaimed. 
The  Eoman  Catholic  Bishop  and  clergy  pub- 
lished a  statement  that  "the  proclaiming  of 
Limerick  under  existing  circumstances  was 
quite  unwarrantable." 

The  National  Labour  Executive  took  the  mat- 
ter up.  Mr.  Cathal  0  'Shannon  *  urged  on  the 
Irish  Socialist  Party  the  advisability  of  estab- 
lishing Soviet  Government  in  Ireland.  Mr. 
Johnson,  his  colleague  at  Berne,  hastened  to 
Limerick  to  try  the  experiment  there,  while  Mr. 
0  'Shannon  went  to  England  to  enlist  the  aid  of 
the  Socialist  extremists,  whom  he  met  at  Shef- 
field. 

He  told  his  sympathetic  audience,  the  Confer- 
ence of  the  British  Socialist  Party,  the  moving 
tale  of  how  the  " Limerick  Soviet' '  had  struck 
against ' '  a  military  occupation. ' '  He  called  for 
"a  combination  of  all  the  elements  of  the  Left 
in  South  Wales,  Ireland,  England,  and  Scotland 
to  bring  about  by  their  united  efforts  an  alliance 
of  revolutionary  Socialists,  and  thus  end  the 
white  terror  now  prevailing. ' '  The  Conference 
sent  a  message  of  greeting  to  their  fellow-work- 
ers in  Limerick  "struggling  for  civil  liberty 
against  the  military  authorities  in  Ireland.' ' 

That  they  did  nothing  more  must  have  been 

*  Freeman7 s  Journal,  April  14th,  1919. 


THE  "KESPONSIVE  MOVEMENT' '    247 

disappointing  to  the  Limerick  Soviet,  which 
was  already  printing  notes,  varying  from  one  to 
ten  shillings,  in  anticipation  of  the  Great  Day, 
an  act  which  was  approved  with  great  enthusi- 
asm by  the  Congress  of  the  Independent  Labour 
Party  at  Huddersfield. 

Mr.  Thomas  Johnson  has  revealed  how  great 
a  disappointment  it  was  to  the  Bepublican  lead- 
ers. A  national  strike,  he  says,  would  have  re- 
sulted in  arnied  revolt.  The  National  Execu- 
tive actually  proposed  that  Limerick  should  be 
evacuated  by  all  its  inhabitants,  "  leaving  an 
empty  shell  in  the  hands  of  the  military. ' '  * 
The  local  Soviet,  however,  rejected  the  pro- 
posal, and  the  Limerick  strike  fizzled  out,  be- 
cause, as  Mr.  Johnson  put  it  in  the  speech  just 
quoted,  "  there  was  no  probability  of  a  respon- 
sive movement  in  England  and  Scotland. ' ' 
*  #  *  #  # 

Here  ends  our  survey  of  the  Irish  revolution- 
ary movement.  But  the  movement  itself  has  not 
reached  its  appointed  end.  In  Ireland  its  desul- 
tory warfare  still  goes  on;  in  Great  Britain  it 
still  works  to  obtain  that  "responsive  move- 
ment^ which  Mr.  Johnson  holds  is  essential  to 
its  success. 

*  Speech  at  Irish  Labour  and  Trade  Union  Party  Congress. 
Daily  News,  August  6th,  1919. 


248  A  STATE  OF  WAR 

The  overt  action  of  Sinn  Fein  in  London  is 
carried  on  under  the  aegis  of  the  Self-Deter- 
mination League,  but  its  real  activities  are  on  a 
lower  and  darker  plane.  Time  was  when  it 
found  its  allies  in  the  Fellowship  of  Reconcilia- 
tion. The  Sinn  Fein  badge  and  colours,  white, 
green,  and  yellow,  were  to  be  seen  at  the 
Friends'  Meeting-house  in  Bishopsgate,  where 
the  Fellows  of  Reconciliation  denounced  self- 
defence  because  "  human  life  is  a  sacred  thing 
and  war  abhorrent  in  the  sight  of  God,"  while 
they  would  go  to  Ireland,  inspect  Madame  Mar- 
kievics'  Sinn  Fein  scouts — the  British  Boy 
Scout  movement  was  condemned  as  "tending  to 
foster  militarism" — and  extol  "the  armed 
guards  of  honour  which  they  saw  parading  to 
do  honour  to  the  leaders  of  Easter,  1916." 

Among  the  members  of  the  Fellowship  were 
a  large  number  of  Irishmen  holding  appoint- 
ments in  a  certain  public  office.  In  England 
they  held  classes  to  create  conscientious  objec- 
tors, and  mock  trials  to  instruct  them  in  the  art 
of  defence  should  they  be  made  to  surfer  for 
conscience  sake.  In  Ireland  they  adopted  ster- 
ner methods.  Large  numbers  applied  for  leave 
in  the  spring  of  1916.  Some  never  came  back; 
it  is  alleged  that  many  of  those  who  did  return 
bore  traces,  and  still  bear  them,  of  having  left 


A  NEST  OF  BEVOLUTION         249 

their  conscientious  objections  to  militancy  be- 
hind them  at  Holyhead. 

At  present  the  principal  societies  in  London 
with  which  Sinn  Fein  works  are  the  London 
Workers '  Committee,  of  which  Mr.  W.  F.  Wat- 
son is  the  head,  and  the  Workers'  Socialist  Fed- 
eration, over  which  Miss  Sylvia  Pankhurst  pre- 
sides. 

This  latter  organisation  is  very  cosmopolitan 
in  character.  Miss  Pankhurst  is  a  very  ardent 
and  outspoken  champion  of  Bolshevism,  and  all 
who  aim  at  the  overthrow  of  society  find  a  meet- 
ing-place in  Old  Ford  Eoad.  There  shall  we 
find  the  female  Sinn  Fein  orator,  whose  ora- 
torical excesses  have  earned  for  her  a  martyr's 
crown  of  eleven  days'  imprisonment;  the  lady 
who  calls  herself  Belgian,  but  who  has  nephews 
in  the  Bolshevik  army,  who  contributes  to  the 
Dreadnought,  the  organ  of  the  Federation,  par- 
agraphs from  the  most  advanced  Communist 
journals  of  Europe,  such  as  Avanti  and  La 
Vague,  and  who  occupies  her  scanty  leisure  in 
working  for  the  Eussian  Information  Bureau; 
and  on  occasion  Mrs.  Sheehy  Skemngton.  There 
too  might  be  found  one  James  McGrath,  a  rail- 
way clerk  in  the  Camden  Town  goods  office,  until 
his  activities  were  cut  short  in  February  last, 
when  he  was  sentenced  to  six  months'  imprison- 
ment for  attempting  to  send  pistols  to  Ireland, 


250  A  STATE  OF  WAR 

Thither  also  come  at  intervals  mysterious 
Russians,  bringing  advice  and  comfort  and  what 
is  euphemistically  described  as  " assistance.' ' 
One  such  attended  the  meeting  of  the  Federa- 
tion last  "Whitsuntide,  grateful  for  the  skill  with 
which  he  had  been  smuggled  in  and  concealed, 
and  imparting  much  interesting  information 
about  the  Third  International  and  the  methods 
of  Russian  Bolshevism  in  return.  In  reply  Miss 
Pankhurst  spoke  of  the  honour  done  the  Feder- 
ation in  having  a  delegate  sent  to  its  Annual 
Congress  direct  from  the  Soviet  Government 
of  Russia. 

The  Workers'  Socialist  Federation,  indeed, 
has  always  owed  much  to  distinguished  foreign- 
ers. In  its  early  days  it  secured  the  patronage 
and  pecuniary  assistance  of  an  old  friend,  Baron 
Von  Horst.  When  he  was  detected  in  the  distri- 
bution of  seditious  literature  in  Ireland  and  in- 
terned, his  friend,  Miss  Lillian  Troy,  following 
the  direction  of  his  sympathies,  gave  Miss  Pank- 
hurst the  use  of  the  Orpheum  Cinema  Theatre 
at  Croydon.  This  place  at  once  became  a  cen- 
tre of  revolutionary  propaganda.  Mrs.  Sheehy 
Skeffington  spoke,  under  the  Sinn  Fein  flag,  to 
an  audience  largely  composed  of  Russian  Jews. 
In  the  same  hall  David  Ramsay  made  a  speech 
for  which  he  got  six  months'  imprisonment. 


LONDON  WORKERS'  COMMITTEE     251 

The  London  Workers'  Committee  is  the  Lon- 
don counterpart  of  the  Clyde  Workers'  Com- 
mittee. Its  programme  is  the  destruction  of 
parliamentary  government,  and  therefore  it  is 
not  surprising  that  the  Sinn  Fein  badge  is 
largely  in  evidence  at  its  meetings.  This  or- 
ganisation claims  the  authorship  of  many 
strikes  during  the  war,  notably  the  engineering 
strike  in  May,  1917,  which  stopped  work  at 
Erith,  Woolwich,  and  other  munition  centres  at 
a  highly  critical  period.  At  the  Holborn  Em- 
pire on  December  1st,  1918,  Mr.  Watson  boasted 
that  he  had  formed  the  nucleus  of  two  hundred 
Soviets,  that  he  had  corrupted  many  Irish  sol- 
diers, and  that  the  London  Sinn  Feiners  could 
supply  him  with  several  hundred  men  trained  in 
the  use  of  arms. 

This  gentleman's  revolutionary  career  suf- 
fered a  temporary  check  in  consequence  of  an 
indiscreet  speech  at  the  Albert  Hall  on  Febru- 
ary 8th.  On  that  occasion  the  platform  was  dec- 
orated with  the  Sinn  Fein  tricolour  and  the  Red 
Flag,  and  among  the  speakers  were  John  Mac- 
lean, the  Bolshevik  Consul  at  Glasgow;  Mr. 
Israel  Zangwill,  who  has  since  endeavoured 
with  very  indifferent  success  to  explain  away 
his  presence  and  his  speech,  and  Mrs.  Sheehy 
Skeffington,  who  said  that  the  two  nations  who 


252  A  STATE  OF  WAR 

had  done  best  in  the  war  were  Russia  and  Ire- 
land— Russia  because  she  had  ceased  to  fight 
and  Ireland  because  she  had  resisted  conscrip- 
tion. 

The  offices  of  the  London  Workers'  Commit- 
tee are  shared  by  the  Soldiers',  Sailors'  and 
Airmen's  Union,  a  frankly  seditious  organisa- 
tion, run  by  a  man  who  got  up  a  meeting  at 
Folkestone  last  January,  when  the  Colours  of 
the  Guards  had  to  be  brought  back  to  London, 
and  who,  in  consequence  of  the  exploit,  gained 
the  favour  of  the  Daily  Herald.  Later  the  Union 
started  a  movement  to  induce  the  Derby  re- 
cruits to  desert  on  the  ground  that  their  term  of 
service  had  expired,  and  was  in  consequence 
turned  out  of  its  offices  in  Whitef riars  Street  as 
an  undesirable  tenant.  This  organisation,  like 
Mr.  Lansbury,  had  a  great  deal  to  do  with  the 
attempted  police  strike  of  the  present  summer, 
and  is  a  favourite  rallying  point  for  Bolsheviks, 
discontented  soldiers,  conscientious  objectors, 
and  Sinn  Feiners. 


CHAPTEE  XV 

CONCLUSIONS 

Pkevious  writers  have  called  attention  to  the 
persistence  and  continuity  of  the  Irish  revo- 
lutionary movement.  It  has  been  the  purpose 
of  this  book  to  show  that  the  Irish  Eepublican- 
ism  of  to-day,  though  in  lineal  descent  from  the 
insurgents  of  the  past,  aiming  at  the  same  goal, 
and  sharing  with  them  certain  attributes  com- 
mon to  all  insurrectionary  organisations,  yet 
differs  from  them  in  many  particulars  of  the 
highest  and  most  urgent  importance  in  their 
bearing  upon  the  Irish  problem  and  its  solution. 
The  present  movement  represents,  indeed,  in 
great  measure  a  revolt  against  its  predecessors. 
It  is  inspired  by  the  conviction  of  their  futility, 
which  it  holds  was  due  to  the  fact  that  the  old 
revolutionists,  though  they  knew  what  they 
wanted,  did  not  really  know  why  they  wanted  it 
or  how  it  could  be  gained.    They  had  an  aim, 

253 


254  CONCLUSIONS 

but  it  was  not  a  conscious  aim,  and  therefore 
all  their  efforts  became  of  no  effect.  They 
hated  British  rule,  but  because  they  never  clear- 
ly grasped  the  reason  for  hating  it,  their  hatred 
never  carried  them  far.  And,  what  in  the  eyes 
of  the  modern  Republicans  is  worse,  a  purpose 
based  on  hatred  tends  to  become  blurred  and 
dim  as  memory  grows  dull. 

To  meet  this  grave  defect  the  Gaelic  League 
and  Sinn  Fein  sought  to  revive  a  positive  prin- 
ciple— nationality — through  the  medium  of  the 
Irish  language.  For  the  language  itself,  out- 
side a  few  enthusiasts  or  sentimentalists,  they 
may  have  had  but  small  regard ;  their  devotion 
to  it  has  been  mainly  due  to  the  belief — possi- 
bly well  founded — that  the  National  Idea  which 
it  would  generate  would  do  more  to  keep  alive 
the  spirit  of  revolt  than  the  negative  principle 
of  hatred  which  had  inspired  the  insurrection- 
ary movements  of  the  past. 

While  men  like  Dr.  Hyde  and  Professor  Mac- 
Neill  thus  sought  to  inspire  the  National  Move- 
ment with  an  intellectual  soul,  the  more  prac- 
tical Mr.  Arthur  Griffith  set  himself  to  develop 
a  spirit  of  national  commercialism,  not  only  as 
an  object  good  in  itself,  but  as  a  most  effective 
weapon  against  British  domination.  Irish  Na- 
tionalism was  to  have  its  own  banks,  its  own 


INSUBBECTION  OLD  AND  NEW    255 

Law  Courts  *  and  schools,  its  own  consular 
service,  mainly  because  thus  would  be  asserted 
the  principle  of  a  separate  nationality. 

In  like  manner  did  James  Connolly  strive  to 
advance  the  interests  of  the  proletariat.  In- 
dustrial freedom,  he  taught,  was  indissolubly 
linked  up  with  national  independence.  In  a  free 
Ireland  only  could  the  Irish  workers  be  free; 
freedom  for  the  workers  of  Ireland  would  be 
incomplete  unless  their  country  also  were  re- 
lieved of  its  shackles. 

The  introduction  of  this  positive  assertion  of 
nationality  marks  a  great  advance,  and  differ- 
entiates the  new  movement  from  the  old  in  a 
surprising  degree.  In  the  first  place  it  pro- 
motes persistency  of  effort.  Nothing  is  more 
noticeable  in  the  old  rebellions  than  their  spas- 
modic manifestations.  The  risings  of  1798, 
1848,  and  1867  were  short-lived.  With  their  de- 
feat the  movement  died  away,  not  to  reappear 
for  a  cycle  of  years.  During  the  intervening 
periods  men  who  had  been  conspirators  became 
constitutional  reformers,  some  abandoned  revo- 
lution altogether,  others  became  valued  serv- 
ants of  the  Crown  against  which  they  had  con- 

*  The  Cork  Examiner  of  September  16th  contains  a  report  of 
a  Sinn  Fein  Arbitration  Court  which  adjudicated  on  a  ques- 
tion of  the  sale  of  an  estate. 


256  CONCLUSIONS 

spired.  The  spirit  which  moved  them  to  vio- 
lence appeared  to  be  rather  the  effervescence  of 
hot-blooded  youth  than  a  solemn  and  deliberate 
policy. 

Movements  so  inspired  could  be  crushed  with- 
out difficulty  when  they  broke  ground ;  there  was 
always  the  hope  on  one  side  and  the  fear  on  the 
other  that  by  the  reform  of  abuses,  by  repara- 
tion for  old  wrongs,  by  generous  legislation,  the 
underlying  hostility  might  be  weakened.  And, 
as  a  fact,  these  hopes  and  fears  were  to  a  great 
extent  justified  by  events.  Compared  with  the 
rebellion  of  1798,  the  risings  of  Smith  O'Brien 
and  James  Stephens  were  little  more  than  riots. 
The  revolutionary  fever  seemed  to  be  burning 
itself  out ;  the  idea  of  national  independence  ap- 
peared to  be  moving  towards  the  academic  stage 
and  to  be  becoming  a  tradition  rather  than  a 
principle. 

The  new  Nationalism  has  changed  all  that. 
It  takes  no  account  of  the  history  of  British 
rule,  it  takes  account  only  of  the  fact  of  British 
rule.  It  is  as  little  revengeful  for  past  wrongs 
— and  there  have  been  wrongs — as  it  is  grate- 
ful for  benefits — and  they  are  neither  small  nor 
few. 

' '  Our  Nationalism  is  not  founded  upon  griev- 
ances.   We  are  opposed  not  to  English  mis- 


SINN  FEIN  PERSISTENT  257 

government,  but  to  English  government  in  Ire- 
land."* 

Here,  then,  we  are  face  to  face  with  an  abid- 
ing principle  of  insurgency.  Evil  memories 
may  be  transient,  withered  by  time  or  effaced 
by  gratitude,  but  hatred  of  a  fact  persists  so 
long  as  the  fact  continues. 

To  perceive  the  operation  of  this  spirit  it 
needs  only  to  read  Irish  history  since  Easter, 
1916.  Such  a  defeat  as  was  inflicted  on  the 
rebels  in  that  year  would  have  crushed  previous 
revolutionary  movements  for  half  a  century. 
It  did  not  check  the  new  Nationalism  for  a 
month.  With  their  leaders  dead  or  in  prison, 
the  Republicans  were  planning  a  new  rebellion 
for  the  following  year.  When  that  effort  failed, 
they  set  themselves  to  foil  every  attempt  at  con- 
ciliation, and  succeeded. 

In  former  times  the  irreconcilable  conspira- 
tors, when  their  plans  went  awry,  withdrew  into 
obscurity  to  prepare  new  conspiracies.  The 
new  Nationalists,  on  the  contrary,  have  come 
out  more  boldly  into  the  light  of  day,  establish- 
ing a  National  Parliament  and  issuing  the  pros- 
pectus of  a  National  Loan,  the  interest  of  which 
shall  become  payable  on  the  international  rec- 
ognition of  the  Irish  Republic. 

*See  p.  194. 


258  CONCLUSIONS 

They  have  proclaimed  a  state  of  war,  and 
are  carrying  on  a  guerilla  warfare  of  a  peculiar- 
ly barbarous  character.  There  have  been  peri- 
ods of  barbarous  crime  in  Ireland's  troubled 
history.  But  in  the  worst  of  those  periods  there 
was  some  ostensible  motive  for  the  barbarity.  A 
landlord  might  be  suspected  of  severity,  a 
farmer  might  be  held  in  abhorrence  for  taking 
an  evicted  farm,  a  man  might  be  regarded  as 
an  informer  or  traitor,  there  might  be  some 
personal  or  family  feud — there  were  many  mo- 
tives which  could  never  excuse  the  crime,  but 
which  might,  at  least,  explain  it. 

There  is  no  such  explanation,  no  such  excuse 
as  "the  wild  justice  of  revenge/ '  for  the  crimes 
of  to-day.  They  are  not  wanton,  they  are  cold 
and  calculated ;  they  are  not  the  outcome  of  per- 
sonal passion,  they  are  "the  diabolical  work  of 
an  organisation."  *  Eecalling  the  terms  of  the 
Proclamation  issued  by  Sinn  Fein  and  quoted 
in  a  previous  chapter,  the  organisation  which 
directs  such  deeds  can  readily  be  identified. 
And  so  in  Ireland  to-day  no  man  is  safe,  what- 
ever be  his  character  or  innocency  of  life,  if  he 


*  Eev.  Thomas  MacBrien,  C.C.  Letter  written  in  reference  to 
the  murder  of  Sergeant  Brady,  and  published  in  the  Dublin 
Daily  Express,  September  17th,  1919.  Mr.  MacBrien  is  a 
JBoman  Catholic  priest. 


THE  IMPLACABLE  FOE  259 

stands  in  the  way  of  the  new  Nationalism  by 
reason  of  his  attachment  to  British  rule,  or  by 
his  willingness  to  discharge  the  ordinary  duties 
of  a  citizen. 

There  is  no  weakness  or  wavering  in  the 
ranks  of  the  Irish  Republicans.  They  speak, 
not  as  defeated  rebels,  but  as  men  dictating 
terms  to  a  conquered  enemy.  They  do  not  even 
deign  to  parley  with  Great  Britain,  or  to  offer 
her  Ireland's  friendship  in  return  for  Ireland's 
freedom.  Such  language  was  held  by  the  revo- 
lutionists of  the  past :  those  of  the  present  are 
more  inexorable.  To  them  Great  Britain  is  not 
only  a  country  from  whose  rule  they  desire  to 
escape,  but  a  country  which  must  be  brought 
down  in  headlong  ruin.  In  India,  in  Egypt,  in 
South  Africa,  wherever  England  has  a  vulner- 
able spot  or  disaffected  subjects,  these  are  the 
places  and  the  people  for  which  Sinn  Fein  has 
the  most  special  regard  and  to  which  it  is  most 
profuse  in  its  promises  of  help. 

It  is  not,  however,  on  its  intellectual  and 
political  side  that  the  new  movement  is  most 
sharply  differentiated  from  the  old.  Infinitely 
more  novel  and  more  menacing  are  its  economic 
developments,  not  only  by  reason  of  their  in- 
trinsic nature,  but  in  their  effect  upon  any  pos- 
sible proposals  for  a  settlement  of  the  Irish 


260  CONCLUSIONS 

question.  Those  proposals  range  from  the  grant 
of  complete  independence,  favoured  by  Mr. 
Childers,  to  some  such  form  of  self-government 
as  is  contained  in  the  Home  Rule  Act.  To  dis- 
cuss the  merits  of  any  of  them  is  outside  the 
purview  of  this  volume,  but  it  would  have  been 
written  in  vain  were  the  facts  which  it  describes 
not  taken  into  account  in  the  consideration  of 
them. 

The  precise  relations  between  Sinn  Fein  and 
Labour  are  not  easy  to  calculate,  but  there  are 
certain  phenomena  which  suggest  that  they  are 
intimate,  more  intimate  perhaps  than  is  sus- 
pected by  those  who  talk  glibly  of  settling  the 
Irish  question  by  constitutional  concession. 

Although  Sinn  Fein  means  self-reliance,  it  is 
the  settled  policy  of  the  Sinn  Feiners  to  attain 
their  main  object  through  foreign  aid.  Ger- 
many has  failed  them;  America  is  alternately 
threatened  and  cajoled,  but  in  their  inmost 
hearts  the  Irish  Republicans  are  doubtful  of 
success  in  that  direction.  Failing  America, 
there  remains  not  a  single  nation  that  can  help ; 
but  there  does  remain  a  revolutionary  system, 
an  Ishmael  of  humanity,  whose  only  hope  of  ex- 
istence lies  in  the  fomentation  of  revolt  against 
established  order.  The  Russian  Soviet  Repub- 
lic, seeking  to  break  down  surrounding  capital- 
istic institutions,  and  even  Socialist  institutions 


SINN  FEIN  AND  LABOUR         261 

if  they  connote  stability  or  conformity  to  estab- 
lished doctrines  of  government,  is  itself  seeking 
for  allies  in  every  direction,  and  so  to  Moscow 
Ireland  turns  her  eyes  and  addresses  her  ap- 
peals. 

Naturally  the  Irish  Labour  Party  is  the  chief 
instrument  of  such  negotiations.  But  Sinn  Fein 
itself,  whatever  be  its  secret  views  of  Bolshe- 
vik doctrine,  has  also  yielded  to  the  pressure  of 
necessity.  The  conversations  and  correspon- 
dence of  Dr.  MacCartan  and  Mr.  Liam  Mel- 
lowes  with  Mr.  L.  Martens  *  cannot  be  disre- 
garded in  this  connection. 

That  there  is  an  understanding  between  the 
Irish  Republicans  and  the  Bolshevik  revolu- 
tionists is  beyond  question.  We  have  seen  how 
their  emissaries  are  always  in  close  touch  with 
the  British  extremists.!  And  it  has  been  shown 
how  periods  of  Labour  unrest  in  Great  Britain 
have  synchronised  with  outbursts  of  crime  and 
outrage  in  Ireland.  The  coincidences  are  too 
marked  to  be  accidental.  Nor  is  it  possible  to 
resist  the  conclusion  that  the  Irish  Republicans 
are  in  receipt  of  monetary  assistance  from  Rus- 
sia. The  operations  of  Sinn  Fein  are  costly. 
Seven  years  ago  it  was  penniless;  to-day  it 
wields  a  huge  organisation,  runs  newspapers, 

*See  Chap.  XIII. 
fSee   Chap.   XIV. 


262  CONCLUSIONS 

purchases  arms  and  muntions  of  war,  keeps  its 
representatives  abroad,  and  maintains  an  army 
of  officials  at  home.  Even  its  hired  assassins  are 
supplied  with  motor-cars.  It  gets  money  some- 
where, and  the  Soviet  Republic  is  known  to  be 
spending  large  sums  in  foreign  propaganda. 
The  fact  is  not  concealed.  Bela  Kun  is  not  the 
only  alien  revolutionary  who  has  received 
grants  from  the  Soviet  Treasury.  It  is  known 
that  money  has  reached  this  country,  but  Miss 
Pankhurst  only  accounts  for  a  small  part  of  it. 
And  it  is  not  to  be  overlooked  that,  in  the  revela- 
tions lately  made  by  the  police  authorities,  the 
name  of  Mr.  L.  Martens  occurs  as  one  of  those 
who  are  prominently  concerned  in  this  Bolshe- 
vik propaganda — Mr.  Martens,  with  whom  Mac- 
Cartan  and  Mellowes  are  in  intimate  relation. 

The  inference  will,  of  course,  be  stoutly  de- 
nied. But  so  were  the  financial  transactions  be- 
tween Sinn  Fein  and  Bernstorff  denied  in  Dub- 
lin— and  admitted  in  Berlin. 

It  is  possible,  it  is  even  probable,  that  among 
the  members  of  Sinn  Fein  there  are  many  who 
view  these  economic  tendencies  with  aversion 
and  apprehension.  But,  much  as  they  fear  the 
movement,  they  are  powerless  to  stop  it,  as 
throughout  history  the  moderates  have  always 
been  captured  by  the  extremists.    Revolutions, 


MIBABEAU  AND  MAEAT  263 

it  has  been  said,  devour  their  children;  Mira- 
beau  always  gives  way  to  Marat. 

It  results  from  this  that  schemes  of  settle- 
ment, designed  to  placate  the  moderates  of  Sinn 
Fein,  are  foredoomed  to  failure  for  the  reason 
that  the  moderates  no  longer  count.  One  may 
go  even  further,  and  say  that  schemes  of  settle- 
ment which  might  attract  the  more  stalwart  ad- 
herents of  Sinn  Fein  have  very  little  chance  of 
success.  There  was,  as  we  have  seen,  a  time 
when  Mr.  Griffith  might  have  accepted  the  Con- 
stitution of  1782  in  satisfaction  of  his  demands,* 
though  it  might  not  have  satisfied  the  majority 
of  his  colleagues.  That  time,  as  Mr.  O'Hegarty 
says,  has  gone ;  but  even  had  it  not  gone,  such  a 
proposal  would  be  rejected  by  the  Labour  wing 
of  the  Eepublican  Party,  and  by  those — not  a 
few — of  the  Sinn  Feiners  who  stand  with  them. 

In  formulating  his  economic  policy  and  con- 
structing his  party  of  revolutionary  Labour, 
Connolly  appealed  to  sentiment  and  self-inter- 
est. In  the  former — the  reference  to  the  Old 
Celtic  communal  system — he  sought  the  inspira- 
tion of  his  movement,  in  the  latter  its  driving 
force.  That  force  lies  in  the  belief,  which  he  so 
strenuously  inculcated,  that  all  the  old  Irish  pa- 
triotic movements  had  broken  down  because 

*  See  Chap.  III. 


264  CONCLUSIONS 

they  took  no  account  of  the  interests  of  the 
workers.  Especially  had  the  constitutional  pa- 
triots betrayed  the  interests  of  the  proletariat, 
keeping  alive  and  exploiting  their  wrongs  for 
their  own  selfish  political  purpose.  While  the 
revolutionary  movements  had  not  been  guilty 
of  such  black  treachery,  and  had  even  in  some 
cases  caught  glimpses  of  the  truth,  they  too  had 
failed  because  their  direction  had  fallen  into  the 
hands  of  the  capitalists  and  the  bourgeoisie.  If 
Labour,  then,  is  to  reap  any  reward  for  its  Na- 
tionalism and  any  security  for  itself,  it  must 
look,  in  the  words  of  Wolfe  Tone,  "to  that  re- 
spectable class — the  men  of  no  property." 

The  proletarian  wing  of  the  Republican  Move- 
ment is,  therefore,  unalterably  pledged  to  op- 
pose any  settlement  on  constitutional  lines. 
Even  were  it  not  so  pledged,  its  adhesion  to 
Bolshevism  would  make  the  acceptance  of  con- 
stitutional conditions  impossible.  Already  there 
are  signs  that  Labour  is  somewhat  distrustful 
of  the  more  moderate  Republicans  and  is  deter- 
mined to  impose  its  will  upon  the  movement. 

The  growth  and  influence  of  Irish  Bolshev- 
ism must  be  taken  into  serious  account  in  any 
review  of  the  Irish  problem  and  in  any  remedial 
measures  for  its  solution.  A  Bolshevist  Ireland 
would  be  a  constant  menace  to  the  social  and 


THE  EEAL  ISSUE  265 

industrial  peace  of  Great  Britain.  For  of  all 
modern  creeds  Bolshevism  is  necessarily  the 
most  aggressive.  There  is  no  place  in  a  com- 
munity of  States  based  on  social  order  for  a 
State  founded  upon  anarchy.  Static  conditions 
are  fatal  to  its  existence ;  it  must  proselytise  or 
perish. 

Such  is  the  position  of  Ireland  to-day,  and 
all  because  five  years  ago,  when  the  path  of  con- 
stitutional self-government  within  the  British 
Empire  lay  broad  and  smooth  before  her,  she 
took  the  wrong  turning.  The  road  she  then 
chose  has  led  her  into  wastes  whereof  no  man 
can  see  the  end.  To  all  who  would  help  to  guide 
her  back  to  the  point  from  which  she  went 
astray  she  turns  blind  eyes  and  deaf  ears.  To 
all  who  approach  her  with  offers  of  conciliation 
she  replies  with  Jehu,  "What  hast  thou  to  do 
with  peace?  Turn  thee  behind  me."  On  one 
point  only  is  there  agreement  between  the  war- 
ring factions — that  there  can  be  no  agreement. 
"There  is  no  half-way  house  between  Union 
and  Separation,"  says  Sir  Edward  Carson  at 
Belfast.  And  across  the  Atlantic,  like  an  echo, 
comes  De  Valera's  response,  "There  is  no  half- 
way house  between  Union  and  Separation." 


INDEX 


America,  alliance  with  Ger- 
many and  Ireland,  145; 
Casement  and  an  Anglo- 
Saxon  alliance,  145 

Armistice,  The,  Labour  atti- 
tude, 229 

Aud,  The,  attempt  to  land 
officers  and  arms  in  Ire- 
land, 177 

Berne  Conference,  Irish  dele- 
gates' claim  at,  233 

Bernhardi,  General  von,  Irish 
allies,   131 

Bernstorff,  Count,  appoint- 
ment of  Bishop  of  Cork, 
185;  financial  aid  for  Sinn 
Fein,  162;  German  help  for 
rebellion,  176;  German  in- 
trigue in  America,  154,  171 

Blacam,  Aodh  de,  Bolshevism 
in  Ireland,  108;  Labour, 
power  of,  221 

Bolshevism,  Blacam,  Aodh  de, 
108 ;  exceptional  treatment 
for  Irish,  216;  negotiations 
between  Dr.  MacCartan  and 
Eussian  Soviet  Eepublic, 
213-215;  Sinn  Fein  al- 
liance, 208-228 

British  Army 's  cowardice, 
Warburton,  Lt.-Col.  J.  T., 
152 

British  Socialist  party,  Limer- 
ick strike,  246 

Buckingham  Palace  confer- 
ence, failure  of,  1 

Byrne,  E.  J.,  rescued  from 
hospital,  245 


Casement,  Sir  Eoger,  122; 
accepts  British  knighthood, 
124;  alliance  of  Germany, 
America  and  Ireland,  145; 
Anglo-Saxon  alliance,  126, 
145;  Belgium  and  England, 
124;  Germany  and  Ireland, 
126,  128-130,  157-159;  Ger- 
man sabotage  agents  in 
America,  154;  German  rela- 
tions, 124;  Great  Britain 
and  subject  nationalities, 
143;  freedom  of  the  seas, 
126,  128,  149,  155;  Irish 
Brigade,  123,  160;  Irish- 
men to  arm,  147;  lands  in 
Ireland  and  is  arrested, 
177;  war  anticipated,  141, 
147 

Catholic  Emancipation  Act 
and  agrarian  troubles,  84; 
Connolly,  James,  criticises, 
85 

Chatterton-Hill,  Dr.,  Sinn 
Fein  movement,  205 

Citizen  army,  117;  alliance 
with  Irish  volunteers,  173 

Clan-na-Gael,  assists  Gaelic 
League,  19;  Gaelic  League 
and  politics,  16 

Coalition  Government,  Labour 
opposition  to,   231 

Cohalan,  Dr.  Daniel,  appoint- 
ed Bishop  of  Cork,  German 
influence,  185 

Cohalan,  Judge  D.  J.,  German 
help  for  Irish  rebellion,  176 

Congo,  Casement,  Sir  Eoger, 
124 


267 


268 


INDEX 


Connolly,  James,  8,  43-54; 
British  administration  dur- 
ing famine  of  1846,  90; 
Catholic  Emancipation  Act, 
85 ;  Grattan  's  Parliament, 
62-68;  Industrial  Workers 
of  the  World,  103,  104; 
Irish  Socialist  Republican 
Party,  45;  Labour  and  Pol- 
itics, 104,  116;  Labour  in 
Irish  history,  44;  Land 
Purchase  Act,  23 ;  opposi- 
tion to  Eoyal  celebrations, 
102;  penal  laws,  56;  Poy- 
nings  Law,  58,  59;  Sars- 
field  and  the  siege  of  Lim- 
erick, 53;  seven  years  in 
America,  103 ;  Socialism, 
104-108 ;  strike  campaign, 
114,  115;  United  Irishmen, 
69-71,  75;  Young  Inland- 
ers, 91,  92 

Convention,  The  Irish,  Sinn 
Fein  attitude,   201,  206 

Croke,  Archbishop,  Gaelic 
Athletic  Association  anti- 
English   movement,    17 

Cumann  na  nGaedheal,  20- 
22 

Cunard  Steamship  Company, 
ceases  to  call  at  Queens- 
town,  134 

Daughters  of  Erin  Societies, 

20 
Devoy,  Cypher  code,  171 
Doyle,     Bernard,     release     of 

Sinn  Fein   prisoners,   244 
Dublin  strike  of  1913,  117 
Dublin  Trades  Council,  115 
Dungannon  Clubs,  20 

Education,  Griffith,  Arthur, 
criticised  Irish  system,  32; 
teaching  rebellion  in  schools; 
32 


Emmett  conspiracy,  76,  77 

Factory  laws,  O  'Connell, 
Daniel,  opposition  to,  81 

Famine  of  1846,  89,  90;  Con- 
nolly on  British  adminis- 
tration, 90 

Fellowship  of  Reconciliation, 
Sinn  Fein  alliance,  248 

Fenian  rising,  98 

Figgis,  Darrell,  Soviet  gov- 
ernment, 223 

Flood,   Henry,  60 

Free  Trade,  Griffith,  Arthur, 
31 

Freedom  of  the  seas,  Case- 
ment, Sir  Roger,  126,  128, 
149,  155 

Friends  of  Irish  Freedom,  So- 
ciety of,  196 

Gaelic  Athletic  Association, 
17-19;  Croke,  Archbishop, 
17 

Gaelic  League,  11-17,  21;  fi- 
nancial aid  from  America, 
19;  Hyde,  Dr.  Douglas,  16; 
politics  and,  14-16 

General  election,  1910,  Sinn 
Fein  set-back,  40 

George,  Rt.  Hon.  D.  Lloyd, 
schemes  for  Irish  settle- 
ment, 180-184,  191 

Germany,  alliance  with  Amer- 
ica and  Ireland,  145;  at- 
tempt to  land  arms  in  Ire- 
land, 177,  205;  Casement 
on  German  friendship,  157- 
159 ;  Casement 's  Irish  Bri- 
gade, 123,  160;  intrigue  in 
America,  171;  invasion  of 
Ireland,  Irishmen  to  assist 
German  troops,  170;  Irish 
negotiations  resumed,  1918, 
203;  St.  Patrick's  Day  ban- 
quet,    Berlin,     1918,     203; 


INDEX 


269 


sabotage   agents   in   Ameri- 
ca, 154;  world  power,  151 

German  Irish  Society  in  Ber- 
lin, value  of  Irish  friend- 
ship, 196-199 

Ginnell,  Laurence,  M.P.,  criti- 
cises United  Irish  League, 
112 

Grattan,  Henry,  60 

Grattan 's  Parliament,  62-68 

Great  Britain,  Sinn  Fein  sev- 
ers political  relations,  236 

Griffith,  Arthur,  7;  Austro- 
Hungarian  relations,  25 ; 
British  administration,  Sinn 
Fein  opposition,  35;  Cu- 
mann  na  nGaedheal,  20; 
editor  United  Irishman,  21; 
education  in  Ireland,  32; 
Free  Trade,  31;  Home  Rule 
Bill,  120;  Ireland  not  at 
war  with  Germany,   156 

Hamburg-A  mebica  Line, 
Queenstown  a  port  of  call, 
134 

Hibernians,  Ancient  Order 
(American),  assists  Gaelic 
League,  19 

Home  Rule,  Griffith,  Arthur, 
120;  settlement  by  parti- 
tion, 180,  181,  183,  191; 
Sinn  Fein  attitude,  5 

Horst,  Baron  Von,  132,  134; 
arrest  of,  170;  Workers' 
Socialist  Federation,  250 

Hungary,  resurrection  of, 
Griffith,  Arthur,  25 

Hyde,  Dr.  Douglas,  7;  Gaelic 
League,  11,  14-16 

Imperial  Parliament,  absence 
of  Irish  members,  24,  199 

Industrial  Workers  of  the 
World,  103,  104 


Irish  Brigade,  Casement  fails 
to  raise,  161 

Ireland,  strategic  importance 
of,   126,   128,  149,   150,   155 

Irish  Council  Bill,  1907,  Sinn 
Fein's  opportunity,  38 

Irish  Felon,  95 

Irish  Freedom,  pro -German 
articles  in,  132;  war  antici- 
pated, 141 

Irish  Labour  Party,  116,  117, 
218;  constitution  on  Soviet 
model,  233 ;  Larkin  's  ' '  Call 
to  Arms,"  115;  Sinn  Fein 
alliance,  174,  202;  support 
for  Russian  Soviets,  226 

Irish  Beview,  "Ireland,  Ger- 
many and  the  Next  War," 
128 

Irish  Socialist  Federation  in 
America,  formation  of,  103 

Irish  Socialist  Republican 
Party,  105;  formation  of, 
44,  45 

Irish  Trade  Union  Congress 
(see  also  Irish  Labour  Par- 
ty), 45 

Irish  Transport  and  General 
Workers'  Union,  formation 
of,  111 

Irish  Volunteers,  135-140, 
173,  189,  199;  alliance  with 
Citizen  Army,  173;  person- 
nel of  Committee,  138; 
Redmond's  nominees  repu- 
diated, 166 

Irish   Worker,  115 

Irish  Year  Book,  Sinn  Fein 
publication,  27 

Irishman,  The,  politics  and 
athletics,  18 


Johnson,    Thomas,    Limerick 

strike,  244,  247 
Jones,  Jack,  strike  leaders  and 


270 


INDEX 


organised    political    action, 
233 

Kealing,  John  P.,  German 
Sabotage  agent  in  America, 
154 

Labour  {see  also  Irish  Labour 
Party),  Connolly  hostile  to, 
79-81;  power  of,  221-225 

Labour  and  the  Union,  56-68 

Labour  organisations  in  Ire- 
land, 44 

Lacy,  L.  de,  169 

Lalor,  Fintan,  no  rent  cam- 
paign, 96;  repeal  and  the 
land  question,  94-97 

Land  League,  established 
1879,  99 

Land  Purchase  Act,  23 

Land  question,  no  rent  cam- 
paign, 96;  repeal  of  the 
Union,  94-97 

Lansbury,  George,  Coalition 
Government,  232 

Larkin,  James,  8,  110;  La- 
bour "Call  to  Arms,"  115 

Leslie,  John,  48 

Limerick,  Bishop  of,  praises 
rebels,  179 

Limerick  strike,  245-247 

List,  Frederick,  31 

Logue,  Cardinal,  condemns 
revolutionary  agitation,  201 

London  Workers'  Committee, 
Sinn  Fein  alliance,  249,  251 

Lusitania  atrocity,  effect  on 
Irish-Americans,  172 

McCartan,  Dr.  Patrick,  ar- 
rested at  Halifax,  211; 
Irish  Ambassador  in  Amer- 
ica, 194;  Irish  political  re- 
lations with  Great  Britain 
severed,    236;     negotiations 


with  Eussian  Soviet  Eepub- 
lic,   213-215 

McGarrity,  Joseph,  German 
sabotage  agent  in  America, 
154 

Maclean,  John,  251;  Bolshe- 
vist Socialism  triumphant, 
228 

MacManus,  Seamus,  teaching 
rebellion  in  schools,  32 

MacNeill,  Prof.  John,  146; 
appeals  to  Joseph  McGar- 
rity for  arms,  156;  cancels 
marches  and  parades,  177 

Markieyies,  Countess,  Soviet 
government,  223 ;  treaty 
with  Germany,  225 

Martens,  L.,  Soviet  govern- 
ment ambassador,  214 

Mellowes,  Liam,  arrested  in 
New  York,  211;  Bolshevik 
sympathies,  213 

Meyer,  Prof.  Edouard,  Ireland 
Germany's  ally,  172 

Meyer,  Kuno,  142,  148 

Mitchell,  John,  social  revolu- 
tion, 93 

Moore,  Col.  Maurice,  Irish 
Volunteers,  138 

Morel,  E.  D.,  123,  127 

Nationalist  Party,  Irish 
Council  Bill  1907,  38;  Sinn 
Fein  hostile  to,  3,  5,  37, 
119,   164-167,   192 

O'Brien,  Smith,  rebellion  of, 

1848,  92 
O'Brien,  William,  M.P.,  Sinn 

Fein  scheme  to  capture  his 

party,  39 
O  'Connell,     Daniel,     Emmett 

conspiracy,    77;    hostile    to 

Labour    movement,     79-81; 

opposed  to   Irish  language, 

12 


INDEX 


271 


O'Connor,  Feargus,  disagrees 
with  O'Connell  over  Labour 
question,  81 

O'Hegarty,  P.  S.,  Sinn  Fein 
policy,  30,  41,  120 

O  'Leary,  Jeremiah,  German 
sabotage  agent  in  America, 
154;  indicted  for  treason, 
154 

O 'Shannon,  Cathal,  capitalist 
opposition  to  self-determi- 
nation, 233;  grateful  to 
Soviet  Eepublic,  216;  Soviet 
government,  246 

Owen,  Eobert,  establishes  So- 
cialist colony,  99 

Panxhurst,  Miss  Sylvia, 
Workers '  Socialist  Federa- 
tion,   249,    250 

Parnell,  Charles  Stewart, 
"Last  link"  speech,  100 

Peace  Conference,  Sinn  Fein 
and,  30,  234 

Penal  Laws,  Connolly,  James, 
56;   economic  result,  74 

Poynings'  law,  58 

Qtjeenstown,  Hamburg- 
America  Line  and  Cunard 
Company,  134 

Rebellion  of  1848,  91-93 

Rebellion  of  1916,  178-180; 
release  of  prisoners,  193 

Rebellion  of  1918,  prepara- 
tions for,  235-238 

Redmond,  J.,  M.P.,  policy 
wrecked  by  Sinn  Fein,  6; 
rejects  Home  Rule  by  par- 
tition, 191;  traitor  to  Ire- 
land, 168;  volunteer  split, 
166 

Repeal  of  the  Union,  land 
question  and,  94-97 


Republican  movement  (see  al- 
so Sinn  Fein),  189 
Revolutionary    movements,    3, 

4,  5,  69-83 

Ribbon    Society,    85-88;    oath 

of  membership,  87 
Rooney,  William,  21 

Sarsfield,     Patrick,     James, 

Connolly,  on,  53 
Self-determination  League,  248 
Sinn  Fein,  7,  27-42;  alliance 
with  Labour,  174,  202,  218; 
attitude  towards  Irish  Con- 
vention, 201,  206;  Bolshe- 
vik alliance,  208-228;  Brit- 
ish administration,  34;  Brit- 
ish labour  trouble  and  suc- 
cess of  rebellion,  235;  con- 
stitution and  aims,  27-29; 
criminal  outrages,  200;  fi- 
nanced by  Germany,  158, 
161-163;  O'Hegarty,  P.  S., 
30;  Home  Rule  Act,  5;  hos- 
tile to  Nationalist  party,  3, 

5,  37,  164-167,  119,  192; 
Irish  Council  Bill,  1907,  38; 
Land  Purchase  Act  and,  23 ; 
London  organisations,  248, 
249 ;  members  refuse  to  at- 
tend Westminster,  24,  199 ; 
political  relations  with  Great 
Britain  severed,  236;  prep- 
aration for  second  rebellion, 
235,  238 ;  proclamation 
against  British  rule,  241; 
revolutionary  movement,  3, 
5;   Unionist  attitude,  37 

Skeffington,  Mrs.  Sheehy,  249, 
250,  251 

Smillie,  Robert,  Coalition 
Government,  231 ;  bargain 
with  Sinn  Fein,  224,  227 

Socialism,  Connolly's  scheme, 
105-108;  Irish  Socialist  Re- 
publican party,  44,  45 


272 


INDEX 


Soldiers',  Sailors ',  and  Air- 
men's Union,  252 

Steele,  Thomas,  denounces 
Ribbonmen,  88 

Sweetman,  Roger,  M.P.,  de- 
nounces judges,  policemen, 
etc.,  240 

Thompson,  William,  distribu- 
tion of  wealth,  99 

Tone,  Wolfe,  United  Irish- 
men, 72,  75 

Trade  Unions,  alliance  with 
Repeal  of  the  Union  move- 
ment, 80;  development  of, 
in  1824,  78;  O'Connell's 
hostility,  81;  political  ac- 
tivity, 116;  Ribbon  Society 
and,  86-88;  in  Ireland,  44 

Troy,  Miss  Lillian,  Queens- 
town  and  Ireland's  trade, 
133 

United  Irish  League,  Ginnell, 

Laurence,  M.P.,  112 
United  Irishman,  The,  21 
United  Irishmen,  69-75;  Con- 
nolly, James,  69-71;  demo- 
cratic ideals,  73;  revolu- 
tionary movement,  72-73 ; 
Wolfe  Tone  on  aims  of,  72 


Valera,  E.  de,  179 
Volunteer  movement,  see  Irish 
Volunteers 


Walsh,  J.  J.,  M.P.,  anti- 
British  speech,  221 

War,  anticipated  by  Case- 
ment, 141,  147;  Ireland's 
chance,  2;  Ireland  at  the 
outbreak,  1 

Warburton,  Lt.-Col.  J.  T., 
British  Army 's  cowardice, 
152 

Welsh,  Thomas,  arrested  car- 
rying Sinn  Fein  despatch, 
212 

Westarp,  Count,  speech  on  St. 
Patrick's  Day,  1918,  204 

Worker's   'Republic,   102 

Workers '  Republican  party, 
109 

Workers '  Socialist  Federa- 
tion, Sinn  Fein  and  Rus- 
sian Bolshevism,  249 


Young  Irelanders,  objects  of, 
20;  Connolly,  James,  91, 
92;  reject  Lalor's  Counsels, 
97 


Ireland  an  Enemy 
of  the  Allies? 

(L'IRLANDE—ENNEMIE  ?) 

BY 

R.  C.  ESCOUFLAIRE 

An  illuminating  work  on  the  meaning  of  Irish 
propaganda  and  Sinn  Fein  agitation. 

M.  Escouflaire  is  a  Frenchman  who  for  years  had 
taken  the  Irish  anti-British  propaganda  as  genuine. 
When  in  consequence  of  the  war  he  became  personally 
acquainted  with  the  British,  he  was  unable  to  reconcile 
their  behavior  and  their  ideals  with  what  he  had  heard 
about  them  through  the  Irish.  He  therefore  made  an 
independent  study  of  the  Irish  question,  entering  upon 
it  with  a  perfectly  unprejudiced  mind,  and  the  result 
of  his  discoveries  is  that  he  feels  himself  able  to  pro- 
nounce the  Irish  question  "an  international  imposture. " 
The  reasons  which  led  him  to  this  verdict  are  to  be 
found  in  this  book. 

The  Spectator  says  of  it: 

"  M.  Escouflaire  is  one  of  the  few  foreigners  who 
have  taken  the  trouble  to  study  the  Irish  question, 
instead  of  accepting  at  their  face-value  the 
theatrical  assertions  of  Nationalists  and  Sinn 
Feiners.  .  .  .  His  well-informed  little  book  de- 
serves to  be  widely  read." 

E.  P.  DUTTON  AND  COMPANY 
68 1  Fifth  Avenue  New  York 


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